Green’s Dictionary of Slang

all over the place like a mad woman’s shit phr.

(Aus.) confused, extremely messy.

1957		L. Glassop Call me When the Cross Turns Over 199: In the end he was blood from head to hocks and all over the place like a mad woman’s custard.
1963–74		B. Humphries Barry McKenzie [comic strip] in Complete Barry McKenzie (1988) 93: The old bastard’s been all over the place like a mad woman’s shit. [Ibid.] 116: Them slant-eyed pricks was all over the old Pacific Sea like a madwoman’s shit.
1972		G. Souter Idle Hill of Summer 97: If someone was disorganized he was ‘all over the place like a mad woman’s shit’. Candour and crudity were so fundamental to this society.
1982		N. Keesing Lily on the Dustbin 22: You’ll have rooms ‘all over the place like a madwoman’s breakfast’.
1985		B. Humphries Traveller’s Tool 24: I tend to be all over the place like a mad woman’s shit.
1986		R. Beckett Dinkum Aussie Dict. 35: Madwoman’s breakfast/knitting/lunch: In a dreadful mess. Mad women are deemed to be somewhat sloppy by the general populace.
1986		C. Bowles G’DAY 98: A bloke who doesn’t know what he’s about doesn’t know if he’s Arthur or Martha. Everything he does is all over the place like a mad woman’s custard.
1988		McGill Dict. of Kiwi Sl. 9/2: all over the place, like a madwoman’s shit indicating a mess or poor organisation.
1988		T. Kenrick China White 75: They’re all over the Triangle like a madwoman’s shit.
1998		K. Grenville Writing Book 68: As you’d expect, when I first got out I was all over the place like a mad woman’s lunchbox.
1998		M. Lucashenko Hard Yards 110: It was like fighting with friggin Faith, all over the place like a madwoman's shi.
1999		G. Seal Lingo 127: There are [...] subtle gradations in the types of stupidity, thoughtlessness, hopelessness, incapacity and sheer ineptitude that may come in for verbal censure. A person may be: [...] all over the place like a mad woman’s knitting.
2000		N. Griffiths Grits 272: Malcolm, sprawled out in the cher liker mad woman’s shite.
2003		P. Austen Wild Wild Wets 108: They’re all over the place like a madwoman’s shit! Stupid buggers.
2005		Eyre & Donaldson Dict. National Celebrity 67: They’re all over the place. Like a mad woman’s breakfast.