Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(Aus.) utterly down-and-out.

1924		C.J. Dennis ‘Nocturne’ in Rose of Spadgers 55: Listen – on the square – / I’ve done me tin. I’m bottle-green, dead broke.
1953		K. Tennant Tell Morning This (1967) 197: I done you a good turn [...] I took you in when you hadn’t a stitch, when you were bottle-green and lousy from sleeping in parks.
1968		K. Tennant Foveaux 381: I remember going out to the Bay once, there was a chap in the van, and he was bottle green and lousy from sleeping in the park.
2004		Sydney Morning Herald 18 Jan. 🌐 A man can be considered totally reliable when he comes up with a winner or two but can be just as quickly discarded as a future breadwinner if his luck starts to go bottle-green and lousy.
2010		R. Fitzgerald My Name is Ross 86: Bottle-green and lousy, Herbie was met at the door by an ex- professional boxer called Jimmy Fitz who asked, ‘Are you leading the life you want to live? And if not, has alcohol got anything to do with it?’.