The F-Word (45 page)

b
. Of a thing, a situation, etc.: to go awry; malfunction; break down.

1976
D. Mamet
American Buffalo
35: There’s the least
chance
something might fuck up.
1980
J. Carroll
Land of Laughs
90: How many things are going to fuck up before we get this straightened out.
1982
D.J. Williams
Hit Hard
175 [refers to WWII]: A-17 gun fucked up.
1985
A. Sawislak
Dwarf Rapes Nun
193: In case you miss a transmission or the radios fuck up.
2003
New York Magazine
(Mar. 31) 25/3: But on the other side, the global opposition, and the new, excited homegrown anti-Bush front line, are anticipating…the myriad ways this colossal and quixotic undertaking will invariably fuck up.
2004
S. Kernick
Crime Trade
32: All I was trying to do was nail one of the bad guys. It fucked up, the whole thing fucked up, and I lost a good mate.

3
.
a
. to confound; thwart; interfere with; to befuddle or confuse.

1945
in T. Shibutani
Derelicts of Company K
133: I bet that fuckin’ CO stays awake every night tryin’ to think up some new way to fuck us up.
1950
J. Kerouac in
Selected Letters
239: I don’t see how these cocksuckers
could have done a better job trying to fuck me up as a…novelist.
1968
in E. Knight
Belly Song
15: Perhaps it was just the brother’s definition that fucked me up.
1968–71
M. Cole & S. Black
Checking It Out
223: “It will be six months before they use those rooms again.… ” “That’s cool…I dig fucking up white prejudiced pricks.”
1971–72
L. Giovanitti
Man Who Won the Medal of Honor
109: I said what I said because I had nothing else to go on. I ain’t changing that story now. And nobody’s going to fuck me up. You understand?
1972
D. Wolf
Foul!
313: We could have won, if that dumb coach didn’t fuck us up.
1976
R. E. Chinn
Dig the Nigger Up
37: I’d sure like to do it to her!…She fucks me all up!
1978
E. Thompson
Devil to Pay
156: It was Milt’s idea to cook out. “Really fuck up the neighbors, man. They’ll think it’s springtime.”
1983
D. Mamet
Glengarry Glen Ross
96: What you’re hired for is to
help
us—does that seem clear to you? To
help
us.
Not
to fuck us up.
1989
M. Davis
Miles
193: But Cannonball just fucked me up the way he played the blues and nobody had ever heard of him.
1991
D. Gaines
Teenage Wasteland
232: If you tell anybody who I am, if you fuck me up, man, I’ll find you.
1995
Journal of American Folklore
CVIII. 215: Why aren’t…voices that would fuck theory up included in this collection?
1997
G. Meade
Brandenburg
325: Don’t compromise me, Gonzi. Don’t fuck me up.
2004
M. Boland & M. Bodey
Aussiewood
vi. 100: Once I got into this game and saw how it fucks people up, just fucks them up, I’d grown up and knew what was bullshit.

b
. to make intoxicated.

1971
in H.S. Thompson
Shark Hunt
147: Five reds, enough to fuck
anybody
up.
1980
J. DiFusco et al.
Tracers
46 [refers to Vietnam War]: There’s enough shit here to fuck up the entire squad for at least a week.
2001
Maximum Rocknroll
(Apr.), Man, I wanna get high!… Something to fuck us up. Drugs.

4
. Especially
Black English
. to injure, especially severely; mangle; wound; (especially
Military
) to kill.

1962
in D. Wepman et al.
The Life
(1976) 23: He romped and stomped, and he fucked up his face.
1965
C. Brown
Manchild in the Promised Land
144: Man, those bullets can really fuck you up.
1966–67
P. Thomas
Down These Mean Streets
[refers to
ca
1950]: I felt his fist fuck up my shoulder.
Ibid.
209: Louie, if the motherfucker makes a move, fuck him up good.
1967
in B. Edelman
Dear America
87: The company lost 5 KIA and about
40 wounded. We fucked up at least two times as many Charlies as far as KIA, but we have more wounded.
1970
L. Cole
Street Kids
88: The guy who was on our kid fucked the other guy up. The guy was bleeding from his eye.
1970–71
J. Rubinstein
City Police
358: You think it was a gun?… O.K., pal, just relax, at least he didn’t fuck you up.
1972
T. O’Brien
Combat Zone
76: You don’t get mangled by a mine, you get fucked up.
1972–74
H. Hawes & D. Asher
Raise Up off Me
84: My man from Harlem had overheard the…hassle…and asked if I wanted him to get some cats to fuck up the bass player.
1975
S.P. Smith
American Boys
162: A few losers who’d been fucked up not quite bad enough to be sent home.
1978
W. Brown
Tragic Magic
152: “Fuck him up!” “Waste his ass!”
1982
J. M. Del Vecchio
13th Valley
22: Some innocent dudes always get fucked up and blown away.
1987
L. S. Whiteley
Deadly Green
201 [refers to Vietnam War]: Fuck them up! Fuck them fuckers up!…Get some!
1996
P. Godwin
Mukiwa
xii. 221: Don’t wade in. Let them fuck each other up first, then arrest anything that doesn’t move.
1997
New Yorker
(July 21) 38: Or I can wait for you after work and fuck you up.
2000
G. Marinovich & J. Silva
Bang-Bang Club
xv. 221: Joao responded by telling Dave, a good friend, that if he did not leave him alone he’d fuck him up.

5
.
Black English
. to fool around.

1969
U. Hannerz
Soulside
62: I earn good money, you know, with those two jobs, and my old lady earns a lot on her job, so actually I don’t have to leave too much money at home ’cause she takes care of much of that. So this means I got a lot to spend just fucking up.
1970
A. Young
Snakes
125: We both need to get away from this old school grind for awhile. Why don’t we go out and fuck up tonight? It’s Friday, man.… Let’s go out and party!

In Phrase:

could fuck up a wet dream
, Originally
Military
. is or are exceedingly clumsy, stupid, or despicable.

1967
A. Dubus
Lieutenant
52 [refers to 1956]: Freeman, you are nothing but a skinny turd and would fuck up a wet dream.
1971
R. Flanagan
Maggot
242 [refers to
ca
1956]: They fuck-up everything. Some of them would fuck-up a wet dream.
1975
J. Wambaugh
Choirboys
185: Roscoe Rules could fuck up a wet dream.
1966–80
J. McAleer & B. Dickson
Unit Pride
391 [refers to
ca
1951]: Billy, I swear you’d fuck up a wet dream.
1984
W. J. Caunitz
One Police Plaza
193: That guy could fuck up a wet dream.
1987
D. Sherman
Main Force
191 [refers to 1966]: Lewis, you’d fuck up a wet dream. Go back to sleep.
1988
J. L. Burke
Heaven’s Prisoners
221: Then they see a guy that’s got all the things they want and can’t have because most of them are so dumb they’d fuck up a wet dream.
1990
C. Lucas
Prelude to a Kiss
48: It’s a real busman’s holiday with you around, you know? You could fuck up a wet dream!
2002
M. A. Kahn
Trophy Widow
37: Those five-hundred-dollar-an-hour yahoos could fuck up a wet dream.
2003
C. Weber
Baby Momma Drama
76: Damn, Jasmine, you could fuck up a wet dream, you know that? Why don’t you lighten the fuck up for once?

fuckwad
noun

a stupid or contemptible person; an asshole.

1974
U.S. student slang survey: Motherfucker, fuckwad, sonofabitch, [etc.].
1986
J. Cain
Suicide Squad
97: I wanna see ID cards on all these fuckwads.
1987
“J. Hawkins”
Tunnel Warriors
144: That goofy fuckwad.
1990
E. W. Rukuza
West Coast Turnaround
8: Some fuckwad was shootin’ up da scenery wit’ a machine gun.
1997
S. Lopez
Sunday Macaroni Club
209: These fuckwads decide to go swimming and now they complain about getting wet. Joey hated working with amateurs.
2002
A. Davies
Frog King
284: Think about someone else for a change, fuckwad.
2006
J. McManus
Physical
87: As I performed my husbandly duty sans condom, however, I was hoping, like a bona fide fuckwad, that somehow it wouldn’t quite take.

fuckwind
noun

the kestrel. Cf.
WINDFUCKER
noun
.

1611
R. Cotgrave
Dictionary of the French & English Tongues
s.v.
Crecerelle
, A Rattle, or Clacke for children to play wtih; also, a Kestrell, Fleingall, or Fuck-winde. [
1847
J. O. Halliwell
Dictionary of Archaic & Provincial Words
I.,
Fuckwind
, a species of hawk. North.]

fuckwit
noun

Chiefly
Australian & British
a stupid person. Hence
fuckwittage
,
noun
, stupidity.

1968
A. Buzo in
Plays
89: Well, ta-ta for now, fuckwit.
1970
S. Jarratt
Permissive Australia
142: Of course they do, you fuckwit.
1979
in
Australian National Dictionary
: It sounded like a load of fuck-wit shit to me.
1986
M. Johnson
Lear
7: It is not your turn, fuckwits!
1992
I. Banks
Crow Road
vi. 144: How can he be such a great guy, and clever and just…just a good friend, and some fuckwit forgetting to look both ways cancels out all that…probably not even a fuckwit; probably some ordinary guy thinking about something else.
1995
Will Self in
Esquire
(Feb.) 108: Dear Fuckwit.
1997
N.Y. Press
(Aug. 27) 30: Fuckwit on a wet-bike.
1998
H. Fielding
Bridget Jones’s Diary
18: Sharon started on a long illustrative list of emotional fuckwittage in progress in our friends: one whose boyfriend of thirteen years refuses to even discuss living together [etc.].
Ibid.
66: I am not interested in fuckwittage.
2000
Z. Smith
White Teeth
viii. 185: I’m the sympathetic side of the service industry, I’m service with a fucking smile, I’d wear a little red tie and a little red hat like them fuckwits in Mr Burger if my fuckin’ head weren’t so big.
2004
Vanity Fair
(Apr.) 222/1: I just can’t believe I got mixed up with such a strange group of fuckwits.
2007
B. Eisler
Requiem for an Assassin
98: The first time it had been in the gut, but Dox had seen it coming and even though the fuckwit knew how to punch, the damage hadn’t been too bad.

fuckwitted
adjective

Chiefly
Australian & British
stupid.

1971
in J. Hibberd
Stretch of Imagination
40: You two-timing, fuckwitted mongrel of a slut!
1973
in
Australian National Dictionary
: That fuckwitted agent of yours is really driving me right off my brain.
1982
E. Haley & L. Rosser
Memories of an Australian Girlhood
25: Pancho’s the only guy fuck-witted enough to put up with her.
1996
ikon
(Jan.–Feb.) 35/2: She understands business enough to know that mindlessly “political” songs about Ireland will go down a storm 7,000 miles away with fuckwitted Americans who have just decided that they are, like, rilly down with the situation in Northern Ireland.
1998
E. Brimson
Hooligan
xxxv. 98: He knew the city lads well and now had a pub full of serious drinkers rather than soppy, fuck-witted tourists.
2008
G. Canardeaux
Cuisine du Moi
iii. 66: Like, it’s cost me zero to make, a few quid to serve, but—on the other side of the ledger—it’s made these fuckwitted customers think their own shit doesn’t stink.