deadleg
See also: dead leg
English
Etymology
Alternative forms
Noun
deadleg (plural deadlegs)
- A lazy or weak person.
- 1961, Shelagh Delaney, The Lion in Love: A Play, page 83:
- I was a bit of a deadleg in them days. You know, footloose and inclined to be rather flirtatious with the ladies.
- 1966, Maurice Procter, His weight in gold, page 56:
- "I can tell you now, he's a no-good," said the Liverpool D.C.I. "His form is nothing to speak of, but he's the errand lad and head butterer-up for a deadleg called Pete Garside.
- 1987, R. Calam, C. Franchi, Child Abuse and Its Consequences, →ISBN, page 76:
- For the next year Liz lived alone with Lindy, occasionally consorting with 'more deadlegs', one of whom bruised Lindy when he had been drinking.
- An isolated section of pipeline that does not usually carry a flow.
- 1996, K. Carr-Brion, J. R. P. Clarke, Sampling Systems for Process Analysers, →ISBN, page 182:
- There should be minimum deadleg between the valve and main process unit and, if possible, means for cleaning the deadleg.
- 2015, Jonathan Waldman, Rust: The Longest War, →ISBN, page 246:
- The pig trap was just under forty feet long, but the final six-foot section was a deadleg.
- 2018, Wayne P. Olson, Sterilization of Drugs and Devices: Technologies for the 21st Century, →ISBN:
- Since air is denser than steam at sterilization temperatures, air will be displaced downward in the deadleg.
- Alternative form of dead leg (injury to the upper thigh)
- 1992, Bomb, page 66:
- Gordon Biggs, on his way to biology, his favorite class, turns a corner and is immediately seized and stunned by a deadleg to the thigh, (judicious application of the knee to the fleshy part of the upper leg, resulting in prolonged numbness, hence the term 'deadleg').
- (sports) A movement in which the hips and knees are kept straight and stiff and the ankle is flexed.
- 2017, Clive Brewer, Athletic Movement Skills: Training for Sports Performance, →ISBN, page 202:
- Deadleg drills can also be performed by having one leg serve as the dealeg (hips and knees stiff, ankles dorsiflexed, active ground contact with the foot and the heel adhering o the credit card rule) and having the opposite leg perform other drills, such as A-skips, B-skips or straight-leg skips.
- (shipping) A vehicle that is traveling on a leg of its route in which it does not carry any cargo.
- 1984, Gavin Grant Maasdorp, Transport Policies and Economic Development in Southern Africa:
- Companies can transport on a nationwide basis but usually only carry their products out and have a deadleg on the return trip, e.g., the sugar distributors.
- 2001, Andrew Gurr, A Little Piece of England, page 79:
- Our convoy appeared as a huge centipede, winding its way uphill that had acquired various deadlegs at random.
Verb
deadleg (third-person singular simple present deadlegs, present participle deadlegging, simple past and past participle deadlegged)
- (transitive) To knee someone in the thigh.
References
- Dictionary of Contemporary Slang