Dictionary of Contemporary Slang (95 page)

lame-arse
n, adj British

(a person who is) unpleasant, unfair, obnoxious. A vogue term from the language of adolescents in the late 1990s, probably adopted from the following American usage.

lame-ass
n, adj American

(a person who is) feeble, disappointing, unconvincing. An embellishment of the colloquial ‘lame'.

another lame-ass excuse

lamebrain
n, adj

(a person who is) dim-witted. Lame has been used to mean feeble or weak in colloquial speech throughout the anglophone community. This compound form was coined in the 1960s in the USA, whence it spread in the 1970s.

‘“English people don't expect high standards because they don't know how to go out and eat in restaurants”, scolds Payton. “We're also lamebrains when it comes to going to the cinema”.'
(
Evening Standard
magazine, May 1989)

lamer
n

an inadequate person. An item of internet slang, used for instance by
hackers
since the 1990s.

lamp
vb

1.
to look (at), to eye. The term, currently in vogue among fashionable adolescents in Britain, comes from a now archaic three-hundred-year-old use of lamp as a slang synonym for an eye.

2.
British
to hit, beat up or attack. A now dated usage perhaps combining elements of ‘lam', in the sense of beat, and lump. The word was frequently used with this meaning in the 1950s.

3.
Australian
to have sex with. A synonym of
lam
,
slam
.

4.
to relax. A contemporary synonym of
chill
.

lancing
n British

having sex. A synonym is
jousting
. An item of student slang in use in London and elsewhere since around 2000.

laney, lany, lani, lainie
adj

inferior, worthless. These recent vogue terms are probably deformations of the obsolescent American slang ‘lane', which signified unsophisticated, provincial or naïve, and which was said to derive from the notion of a rustic living on a country lane. Originating in American adolescent speech in the 1980s, these variants were adopted by young British speakers in the 1990s.

langered
adj British

extremely drunk. A vogue term in the adolescent drinkers' lexicon since the mid-1990s.

lani
n South African

a white person. Recorded as an item of Sowetan slang in the
Cape Sunday Times
, 29 January 1995.

laoy dat
exclamation, vb British

an alternative version of ‘allow that'

lard
n American

a police officer or the police. The usage is derived from the earlier
bacon
and
pig
.

lard-ass, lard-bucket
n American

a fat person. The American equivalents of the British ‘tub of lard'.

lard-head
n

a stupid or slow-witted person. An expression used in Australia and the USA.

lardo
n

a fat person. An innocuous variant of
lard-ass
.

‘Apart from being a congenital lardo, [Clive] James has a further hurdle before he can reasonably take part in the proceleb car chase: he can't drive.'
(
Independent
, 23 December 1988)

lare
n Australian

an alternative spelling of
lair

large
¹
n British

one thousand, a
grand
. A shortening of ‘large one(s)', used typically by criminals, market traders, gamblers, etc.

I give him five large and asked him to get hold of some gear for me
.

large
²
adj British

excellent, powerful, exciting. A vogue term of approbation among devotees of
rave
, techno and
indie
subcultures since the 1990s. This usage also occurs in North American adolescent speech.

large it
vb British

to enjoy oneself, behave boisterously. Together with
large
and
give it large
, this was a vogue term among devotees of
rave
and
indie
culture in 1994, although it had been recorded in London usage in 1991 and may originally have been adopted from black American speech.

large portions
n British

enjoyment. Recorded in the Midlands in 2005, usually in the phrase ‘get large portions', this is an elaboration of the earlier slang sense of
large
.

larrikin
n Australian

a ruffian, ne'er-do-well. The word has been in use in Australia since the mid-19th century and may be a native coinage or an imported British dialect term based on ‘lark'. It is not usually strongly pejorative, having the sense of (fairly harmlessly) rowdy and cheeky.

larrup
vb

to beat, spank, thrash. A word used by toughs in Australia but mainly by parents to children in Britain, where it now sounds rather dated. The term may be a blend of ‘leather' and ‘wallop' or may be an attempt to imitate the sound of blows landing.

Larry the loner
n British

an outcast, misfit, lonely person. In playground usage since 2000. The term is a less common synonym of
Billy no-mates
.

larupped
adj British

drunk. An item of student slang in use in London and elsewhere since around 2000.

lary
adj

an alternative form of
lairy
or
leery

lash
¹
n Australian

1.
a rampage, bout of wild behaviour

to go on a lash/have a bit of a lash

2.
an attempt, try. A variant of ‘bash' as in ‘have a bash (at)'.

lash
²
vb

to have sex. A term used by young street-gang members in London since around 2000.

lashed, lash
adj British

drunk. The terms, recorded in South Wales in 2000, probably postdate the phrase
on the lash
.

lash it
vb British

to keep quiet, restrain oneself. The expression, from provincial rather than London speech, often occurs as an imperative.

Just lash it, will you!

later(s)
exclamation

1.
an allpurpose farewell. An abbreviation of the standard ‘see you/catch you later', probably originating in US speech but heard among UK teenagers in the 1990s.

2.
a threat to be carried out in future, as implied by statements such as ‘I'll see you/deal with you/get you later'

These terms, from code employed among adolescent gang members, were adopted as fashionable expressions among adolescents in general from the mid-1990s.

lates
exclamation American

a farewell, used by university students in 2012

lathered
adj British

drunk. The word may suggest the image of beer froth or saliva on the face of the drinker or may, like many similar terms, be based on the notion of beating/punishment as conveyed by the colloquial sense of ‘lather', meaning to thrash. An item of student slang in use in London and elsewhere since around 2000.

‘…topics that might appear unrelated to those not pleasantly lathered at this comfortably indecent hour.'
(
Q
magazine, March 1997)

lattie
n British

a flat, home. This item of
parlyaree
originated as ‘lettie' (from the Italian
letto
), denoting a bed. Most recently it has occurred in
gay
and theatrical speech.

laughing boy
n British

a.
a morose, grumbling, sullen or excessively serious-looking person. The phrase is used with heavy irony to deride or provoke someone thought to be unnecessarily grumpy, stern or self-pitying.

Why don't you go and ask laughing boy over there
.

b.
someone who is smirking or offensively cheerful. A less common subsense of the term.

laughing gear
n British

the mouth. A joky euphemism playing on the notion of body parts as equipment on the lines of
wedding tackle
. It probably dates from the 1970s.

‘Get your laughing gear around this!'
(Dialogue in TV advertisement for Heineken beer, 1988)

laughing soup/water/juice
n

alcohol. These are middle-class witticisms applied particularly to champagne or gin. Laughing water also recalls the Indian princess in Longfellow's long narrative poem
Hiawatha
. Similar terms still in use are
giggle water
,
electric soup
or
lunatic soup
.

launch lunch
vb American

to vomit

‘He looked like he was into it, but she looked like she was going to launch lunch over Mr Jurgen.'
(
Things To Do In Denver When You're Dead
, US film, 1996)

lavender
adj

(of a male) homosexual,
gay
. A facetious term appropriated from the vocabulary of heterosexual mockers for use by the gay community itself; the colour and scent of lavender being thought of as quintessentially feminine and old-maidish respectively.

lay
¹
n

a.
a person viewed or evaluated as a sexual partner

b.
an act of sexual intercourse

He's not interested in her, he's just looking for a lay
.

These uses of the word spread to British English from the USA with the verb form during the 1950s and 1960s, becoming established by the early 1970s. In the first sense the word is nearly always used in combinations such as ‘a good lay' or ‘an easy lay'.

lay
²
vb

to have sex (with). The verb was absorbed into British English gradually during the 1950s and 1960s from the USA, where it had been current since the turn of the 20th century. The term implies sex from the male viewpoint but during the
hippy
era began to be used by women. The word is a development of the literal sense of to lay someone down and of the euphemistic ‘lie with', meaning to copulate with, well known from its use in the King James translation of the Bible.

‘One time I thought she was trying to make me come lay her – flirting to herself at the sink – lay back on huge bed that filled most of the room, dress up round her hips.'
(
Kaddish
, poem by Allen Ginsberg, 1958)

lay down
vb See
lie down

lay (someone) down
vb American

to kill. A euphemism used among black street gangs in the late 1980s.

lay (something) on (someone)
vb

to inflict or impose on. This is one of many expressions, originating in black speech, which were disseminated during the
hippy
era, often in the form e.g. ‘lay a (heavy) trip on'.

lay one on someone
vb

to hit, punch someone. A euphemistic expression on the same lines as ‘stick one on',
put/hang one on someone
.

If that joker doesn't stop mouthing off I'm going to be forced to lay one on him
.

lay rubber
vb American

to drive very fast, especially from a standing start, in a car or on a motorcycle. The phrase is inspired by the shedding of tyre rubber when spinning the wheels at speed, a technique used in
drag
racing to ensure good road adhesion at the beginning of a race.

lay some on
vb British

to acquire illicit drugs. The term usually applies to
scoring
for personal use and was in currency among aficionados of dancefloor culture in the 1990s.

lay the smack-down (on someone)
vb American

to defeat, beat. The term has been part of the lexicon of street gangs and
rap
aficionados since 2000.

Lazy Y
n See
lunching at the Lazy Y

leaf
n

marihuana. A predictable nickname for herbal cannabis.

We blew some leaf and mellowed out
.

leak
n

an act of urination. Usually in the expressions ‘have a leak' or ‘take a leak'. The origin of this predictable usage may be nautical.

lean
adj British

under the influence of illicit drugs. The usage, which appeared in the late 1990s, is possibly related to the American
laney
.

‘Nowadays lean in youth parlance has less to do with slim and healthy than spaced and out. It is the consequence of indulging in untold quantities of unspecified substances.'
(
Sunday Telegraph
magazine, 15 December 1996)