Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(Aus.) a sexually attractive woman.

1968

J. Alard He who Shoots Last 91: Dose Hollywood dolls is real table boids, not like de old boilers I gotta settle for.

a man whose sexual desire is so intense that he makes love to his partner over the dining/kitchen table rather than waiting until they reach the bedroom.

1984

Partridge DSUE (8th edn) 1193: [...] late C.19–20.

(orig. US) to circulate among the tables at a restaurant, greeting and chatting with friends and acquaintances; thus table-hopper, table-hopping n.

1937		Stage 15 77: Usually his idea is to go somewhere where he will see some of his friends and indulge in the quaintly called table-hopping. This is always an enjoyable sport, and gives the doer a certain sense of exhilaration and importance.
1946		N. Anthony How to grow Old Disgracefully 172: Parties were thrown in every room and it seemed to be the custom to go ‘room-hopping,’ a pastime similar to ‘table-hopping’ in a restaurant .
1952		East Liverpool (OH) Rev. 12/2: Table hopping is practiced everywhere. But in Hollywood there’s a practice referred to as ‘people-hopping.’.
1978		R. Charles Brother Ray 228: I just ain’t a partygoer or a table-hopper. So I made a point of avoiding the places where the famous [...] hung out.
1987		G. Avakian q. in Firestone Swing, Swing, Swing 193: ‘Benny didn’t really mix with the public. He wouldn’t go table-hopping’.
1991		Stage (London) 21 Mar. 7/3: During the break the table-hopping David Merlin moved around the auditorium.
2002		R. Gordon Can’t Be Satisfied 159: Muddy had no band to hide behind, no club to table-hop.

(US) amongst baseball players, a woman, e.g. an air hostess, who one takes out to dinner.

1970

J. Bouton Ball Four 218: It’s not bad form to wine and dine an attractive stew, however. A stew can come under the heading of class stuff, or table pussy.

(US) an unprofessional, part-time lay preacher.

1955

PADS 23 35: The average white Southerner may use the term jackleg preacher freely as a gloss for such more local terms as chairbacker, stump-knocker, table-tapper, and yard-ax – designations for a part-time voluntary preacher, normally without formal seminary training and generally with a low degree of competence.

a necrophile.

1986–7

Maledicta IX 178: So here is something on necrophiles, or lovers of corpses, cadaver cadets, slab boys, table hoppers, and table toppers.

1. to establish friendly relations with someone, to start to settle in.

1917		Lincs. Echo 8 Feb. 2/4: How delightful to get one’s feet under a table once again.
1950		Belfast Teleg. 1 Aug. 4/4: A sandwich [...] ‘stays the pangs,’ they say, ‘but only until one can get one’s feet under the table wgain’.
1973		Liverepool Echo 3 Feb. 23/7: [headline] Chris gets His feet under the Table. Everton’s new secretary [...] moved in officially [...] to work.
2003		Guardian 20 Mar. 🌐 You’re in jail. A man gives you a job – over another who is not in jail and on the face of it is a good citizen, by the way – then once you’ve got your feet under the table you decide you’ve got rights? [...] And now you’ve got no job?

2. of a man, to start living with a woman (occas. vice versa).

1978		K. Waterhouse Whoops-a-Daisy 24: James: Since Marigold returned home she has rarely been outside the house. Smedley: But who’s been inside it? Which Mr Sly-Boots has got his feet under the table ?
1986		P. Barker Liza’s England (1996) 124: She lowered her voice. ‘A man gets his feet under the table, he changes. You mark my words.’.
1999		J. Morrison A Bridge Too Far Ch. 93 🌐 She gets through men like other women get through pan scourers. [...] Just because a man is sharing her bed, he shouldn’t assume that he’s got his feet under the table too.
2003		T. Anderson Battle to Survive 159: I tried to convince my mother that [my father] had not changed and that as soon as he got his feet under the table it will be the same all over again.

(US) to enjoy a period or whole life of unbroken success.

2012		S. Blass Pirate for Life 53: [P]ractically every player struggles at some level. Very few guys run the table and go right from high school to Cooperstown [i.e. the Baseball Hall of Fame].
2016		M. Carey ‘Bad News’ 23: To no one’s surprise, Central ran the table again, finishing with a second straight 24-0 record and earning another state title.

see separate entry.