Green’s Dictionary of Slang

slow adj.

1. unfashionable.

[UK]Sporting Mag. XXI. 29: Long courtships are stupid things, and voted slow.
[UK]C.J. Apperley Life Sportsman 38: John Hawkes and myself always ride in leathers, though people say ‘it looks slow’. I suppose Pritchard thinks corduroys less trouble.

2. of people, dull, lifeless, insipid.

[UK]Paul Pry 11 Dec. n.p.: The ‘slow’ and unconscious traveller would pass by it, thinking to himself, that, as the doors are not open, there is a case of bankruptcy here; but the ‘fast’ man knows better.
[US]Life in Boston & N.Y. (Boston, MA) 6 Apr. n.p.: He smacks his lips and rubs his hands, / And cries — ‘That’s not so slow’.
[Aus]G.C. Mundy Our Antipodes I 282: He prefers [...] the company of gamblers, adventurers, and horse-dealers, to [...] what he would probably call the ‘slower’ classes.
[Ind]Hills & Plains I 34: [of a regiment] ‘The slowest lot I ever met’.
[US]W.C. Gore Student Sl. in Cohen (1997) 22: slow a. Dull-witted, uninteresting.
[US]S. Lewis Babbitt (1974) 265: They were the Bunch, wise, beautiful and amusing; they were Boheminans and urbanites [...] and in cynical superiority to people who were ‘slow’ or ‘tightwad’ they cackled.
[UK]J. Curtis They Drive by Night 45: If he couldn’t get a lift here, he was a bit slow and that was all there was to it.

3. of places, events, dull, boring.

[UK]Thackeray Newcomes II 109: My uncle [...] found the party was what you young fellows call very slow.
[UK]Siliad 97: Where shall we go? The Judge and Jury? No, that’s awful slow.
[UK]E.J. Milliken Childe Chappie’s Pilgrimage 6: For cynic scorn congealed all fantasy / And quick affection of fresh youth, and he / Regarded these as tame and ‘awfully slow’.
[UK]Tom Clare [perf. ] ‘Absolutely Wrong’ 🎵 What fun is life to them?It must be awf’lly slow, / They don’t get much amusement, that's quite clear.
[US]‘O. Henry’ ‘The Gift of the Magi’ in Four Million (1915) 33: ‘Afghanistan?’ the natives said to him through an interpreter. ‘Well, not so slow, do you think?’.
[UK]Harrington & Tate [perf. Marie Lloyd] ‘Customs of the Country’ 🎵 You've been to gay Paree? / What say? You think so? Oui? / Well, the customs of that country are not slow.
[US]Van Loan ‘The Bush League Demon’ in Big League (2004) 42: Professional baseball wasn’t such a slow game after all.
[UK]K. Sampson Powder 179: This was less entertaining than Ye Cracke on a slow night.

4. sexually timid.

A. Smith Natural History of Ballet Girl 46: The loungers [...] begin their flirtations with the Coryphées. If you listen you will be astonished to find how feeble is the dialogue [...] But it appears to make them — the loungers — perfectly happy, ‘slow’ as it is .
[UK]E. Eden Semi-Detached House (1979) 150: Some of the guests, who were what she would have called ‘slow,’ found themselves affected with alarming fits of dejection, accompanied by a distressing tingling in the ears and very burning cheeks.
[Can]R. Service ‘The Woman and the Angel’ in Songs of a Sourdough 71: The women simply adored him, his lips were like Cupid’s bow; / But he never ventured to use them – and so they voted him slow.
[Aus]Sport (Adelaide) 7 Feb. 7/1: Trixie W. is far too slow for Ned R. Buck up, Trix .
[US]O.O. McIntyre New York Day by Day 28 July [synd. col.] My best girl’s a corker, not the kind that’s slow.
[UK]P. Marks Plastic Age 13: She did wish that he was n’t so slow. Why, he had kissed her only once, and that had been a silly peck on the cheek.
[UK]J. Curtis Gilt Kid 75: Fancy staying up as late as this and not having no crumpet. You must be a bit slow.

5. (US black) unsophisticated, lacking in knowledge.

[US]‘Iceberg Slim’ Pimp 98: I knew I was slow. I sure didn’t intend to stay slow.

SE in slang uses

In derivatives

slowie (n.)

a slow dance or song.

[Ire]R. Doyle Commitments 164: They could sing a few slowies. For the oul’ ones.
[UK]K. Sampson Awaydays 93: I find Divine, gassed on Red Witches, and coax her into a slowie.

In compounds

slow-ass (adj.) [SE slow + sfx slough v. + -ass sfx]

(US black) slow.

[US]Twista & The Speedknot Mobstaz ‘In Your World’ 🎵 Here she comes with them big legs, no fat on the back / What’s up shorty, can we kick it tonight and choke on the sack / Come see as I foreplay, freaky at this slow-ass track.
Morn. Call (Allentown, PA) 8 Nov. 30/4: ‘That would prepare people for our slow-ass music’.
[US]Hartford Courant (CT) 25 Sept. B5/3: The person mentioned that the trial judge [...] wrote ‘slow-ass workers some of you are’.
slowball (n.)

(US) a slow person, a dawdler.

[US]E. Hunter ‘See Him Die’ in Jungle Kids (1967) 104: ‘A only just reached us.’ [...] ‘A’s turnin’ into a real slowball.’.
slow boat (n.) [? the song ‘I want to get you on a slow boat to China’; the emphasis is on the supposed exoticism of marijuana, although, given ‘China’, the link should be to opium]

(S.Afr. drugs) a marijuana cigarette.

[SA]J. & W. Branford Dict. S. Afr. Eng. (3rd edn).
slowcoach (n.) [SE slowcoach, one who acts, works, or moves slowly]

an unfashionable person.

[UK]J. Greenwood Little Ragamuffin 48: To sport glass ‘blue bells’ or brass buttons [...] would be to declare yourself a ‘slow coach’ at the very least.
slow connecter (n.)

(US Und.) a second-rate criminal (by criminal standards).

[US]J. Black ‘A Burglar Looks at Laws and Codes’ in Harper’s Mag. CLX 306: To fail to pay the board bill is an admission that he is a ‘slow connecter’; he can’t make the grade.
slow-play (v.) (also slow-walk)

(US prison) to waste time deliberately; to stall someone, e.g. in the payment of a debt.

[US]Bentley & Corbett Prison Sl. 15: Slow Playin’ also Slow Walkin’ To stall someone. ‘He has been slow playin’ me for three weeks and he only owes me two packs.’.
[US]J. Lerner You Got Nothing Coming 20: Any motherfucker tries to slow-play me [...] I’ll lock your ass down all day and fuck your train!
slowpoke (n.) (also poke) [poke (along) under poke v.]

(US) a sluggard, a lethargic, lazy person.

Joliet Signal (IL) 9 Nov. 1/4: What slow-poke ever benefited the world, his friends or himself?
[US]Richmond Wkly Palladium (IN) 23 Mar. n.p.: ‘Hurrah! for the fellow that gets down the hill first — clear the track there, young Slow-poke!’.
[Ire]Roscommon & Leitrim Gaz. 19 Oct. 4/1: [to cows] ‘Come a,ong here, old slowpokes’.
[US]A. Garcia Tough Trip Through Paradise (1977) 45: La Brie [...] starts in and calls me a slowpoke.
Journal (Russell, KS) 30 Dec. 2/1: The slowpoke who is content to have his [...] card in just one paper is blind to his interests.
[US]J. London Tramp Diary in Jack London On the Road (1979) 59: The quiet easy going, the slow pokes & the comets.
W. McCay Little Nemo in Slumberland [comic strip] Geek! You slow poke.
[US]M.G. Hayden ‘Terms Of Disparagement’ in DN IV:iii 210: slow-poke, a slow person. ‘Ella is such a slow-poke, I don’t like to go with her.’.
[US]W. Edge Main Stem 115: Say, ye damn’ slow-pokes. Why in hell don’t you roll those boxes down.
[US]J.T. Farrell World I Never Made 468: Slowpokes! They’re slow as molasses in January.
[US]F. Swados House of Fury (1959) 85: Hurry up, slowpoke.
[US]P. Whelton Angels are Painted Fair 190: Ten minutes I’ve been waiting [...] What kept you pokes?
[Aus]T.A.G. Hungerford Riverslake 179: Good night, old slow-poke.
[US]‘Weldon Hill’ Onionhead (1958) 268: The U-boats [...] preferred to track down the loners, the weak sisters, the slowpokes.
[US]Kerouac letter 27 Aug. in Charters II (1999) 473: There’s such a lack of communication today amongst slowpokes like you and me.
[US]L. Heinemann Paco’s Story (1987) 161: Only a total screaming asshole waits for a slowpoke.
[US]J. Wambaugh Golden Orange (1991) 294: Hurry, slowpoke.
[Aus]P. Carey Theft 21: I was Slow Bones some days, Slow Poke others.
slow track (n.) [the image of the small town or the West Coast being ‘slower’ than New York] (US black)

the West Coast.

[US]Milner & Milner Black Players 48: California pimpin’ is the relaxed style of pimping also known as the slow track.

In phrases

go-slow (n.)

(Aus. prison) the punishment cells.

[NZ]G. Newbold Big Huey 35: They would have me sloughed up in the go-slow for another week while the transfer was arranged.
[Aus]Tupper & Wortley Aus. Prison Sl. Gloss. 🌐 Go slow. A Cell. Used in the sense of confining a prisoner on disciplinary grounds.
have the slows (v.)

1. to suffer some form of imaginary disease to which one attributes lassitude, inactivity etc.

[UK]Partridge DSUE (8th edn) 1091/2: since ca. 1870.

2. (drugs) to be very intoxicated, at which point life outside one’s head seems to crawl by.

[US]E. Folb Runnin’ Down Some Lines 176: Another visual image one gets is the feeling of being weighted down, slowed down [...] having the slows.
slow-em-ups (n.) (also slow-me-down juice) [the effects]

(drugs) any form of barbiturate, tranquillizer or sleeping pill.

[US]E. Folb Runnin’ Down Some Lines 167: Dem stums git you so messed up you be fallin’ on yo’ ass! I always call ’em slow-em-ups.
[UK]N. ‘Razor’ Smith A Few Kind Words and a Loaded Gun 161: He was a rasta [...] He had ended up in the hospital on the ‘slow-me-down juice’, his words, when the screws had tried to cut his hair on reception.
slow on the draw (adj.) [gun-fighting imagery]

1. not very intelligent; slow on the uptake.

[Scot]Dundee Courier 17 Jan. 9/5: [headline] Arbroath Were Slow on the Draw.
[US]Tennessean (Nashville, TN) 2 Apr. 8/4: ‘Sorter slow on the draw, too, ain’t we?’.
[Scot]Dundee Courier 3 Dec. 5/4: [headline] Too Slow on the Draw at dens [...] If the Dundee forwards had been slicker on the draw [etc].
[US]in DARE.
[US]Philadelphia Inquirer (PA) 30 July 1/1: You’d have to be a little slow on the draw to go for a deal like that.
O. Trager Amer. Bk of the Dead n.p.: A lucky few saw them [i.e. the Grateful Dead]; those slow on the draw wouldn’t have a second chance.
W. Hobbs Leaving Protection 91: ‘You’re slow on the draw this morning.’ ‘I’ll have another cup of coffee.’.
[US]Visalia Times-Delta 5 Apr. 6/1: ‘The Grand Jury has been slow on the draw investigating school-child security breeches’ [...] So what to make of this so-called ‘slow on the draw’ and ‘dragging’ on the part of the grand jury?

2. (Irish) reluctant to stand one’s round of drinks.

[Ire]J. Ryan Remembering How We Stood 74: Behan, though generous in many ways [...] was notoriously tight-fisted when it came to buying a round in the company of his coevals – ‘slow on the draw’, as they used to say.
slow on the trigger (adj.) (also slow at the trigger) [gun-fighting imagery]

stupid, dull.

[UK]Clitheroe Advertiser 23 Mar. 8/2: I’m a wretched disconsolate man, / A nervous disatisfied wight / [...] / My wit is gunloaded, right — /I am slow at the trigger that’s all.
[US]Indianapolis Star (IN) 4 May 21/2: The indiana senators are slow on the strigger in the selection of men [...] to recommend.
Kansas City Kansan (KS) 28 July 10/5: Lew Tendler, young and slow on he mental trigger.
Courier (Waterloo, IA) 22 June 2/4: Hamburgers [are] banned fro the diets of police officers [...] Hamburgers [...] make patrolmen listless, sluggish and slow on the trigger.
[UK]Tatler (London) 5 Oct. 33/2: Sir Humbleby Bumbleby, Bart, who is slow on the trigger and is [...] dreaming of the days when he was the Beau of the Garrison.
[US]J. Thompson Getaway in Four Novels (1983) 8: Being a little slow on the trigger, compared with Rudy at least, he continued to stare for a moment longer.
Ithaca Jrnl (NY) 27 Aug. 20/1: Charkey Johnson, rated dependable but slow on the trigger.
slow your roll (v.)

see under roll n.