Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (US) stereotyped of women but equally of men, strong sexual desire; often as have hot pants for.

c.1924		[film title] The Virgin with Hot Pants.
1930		J.P. McEvoy Hollywood Girl 36: A sensational secret diary [...] all perfume and hot pants.
1934		J.H. O’Hara Appointment in Samarra (1935) 163: [of men] I gotta do something besides get up there and give these butter-and-egg men hot pants.
1942		H. Miller Roofs of Paris (1983) 218: The mother must have hot pants too.
1942		W.R. Burnett Quick Brown Fox 46: [of a man] ‘Got a heavy date, that boy. Hot pants is what he got. Wait till he gets hooked up and the wife presents him with a couple of kids. He’ll cool off’.
1952		E. Brown Trespass 153: I told you once that I wasn’t just some little schoolgirl with hot drawers.
1956		J. Curtis Look Long Upon a Monkey 155: Never been any harm in the poor old pet and he did have hot pants for her, the old lecher.
1958		(con. 1950) E. Frankel Band of Brothers 139: The rummy happened to have a singsong girl with hot pants earlier in the evening.
1961		W. Brown Girls on the Rampage [of a man] 35: [of a man] This guy’s got hot pants. He can’t hardly wait to get into the bedroom.
1963		B. Hecht Gaily, Gaily 51: She was a rotten floozy with hot pants who made me sick every time she pushed against me.
1964		H. Selby Jr Last Exit to Brooklyn 118: For krists sake, what the fuck she smilin at? Got hot fuckin pants again.
1965		W.C. Anderson Adam M-1 76: No wonder he had warm britches for the girls.
1969		A. Buzo Rooted III iv: He told Davo that Sandy was hot in the pants for him.
1977		(con. 1960s) D. Goines Black Gangster (1991) 25: All the bitches got hot pants for you.
1978		L. Kramer Faggots 232: The intense interest on the part of this younger woman was giving the older one hot pants.
1979		D. Maitland Breaking Out 177: Jeez, this sheila’s really hot in the pants for me.

2. a sexually eager woman; occas. man.

1939		R. Chandler Big Sleep 83: That goddamned little hot pants!
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).
1954		J.D. MacDonald All These Condemned (2001) 130: Snicker and smirk. Now you take that Judy Jonah. Man, oh, man. Hot pants.
1963		(con. 1944) L. Glassop Rats in New Guinea 136: Little Hot Pants, they called her, and some of the stories about her activities in the locked tuckshop after school an the backstalls of the Majestic Theatre appalled me.
1969		D. Pendleton Executioner (1973) 156: I want my bucks to go to my kids. To the kids, not to Miss Hotpants.
1971		L. Sanders Pleasures of Helen 26: ‘They called me Hot Pants if you must know, because they thought I was always hot for a little loving’.
1985		R.G. Barrett You Wouldn’t Be Dead for Quids (1989) 180: [of a man] Hot pants here’s after a bit of stray snatch.
1996		J. Johnston I Promise 105: I know what you’re up to, miss hot pants. Don’t think I don’t! You’ve had a taste of it, and now you want to try a different flavor.
2006		C. Feehan A Cheristine Feehan Trilogy 312: It certainly wasn’t her fault that rat Bruce Harper is having an affair with little miss hot pants Sylvia Fredrickson.

3. attrib. use of sense 2.

1975

L. Rosten Dear ‘Herm’ 150: She has [...] a 7th sense about whats cooking in the ‘hot pants’ dept.

4. (US) extreme keenness.

1966		B. Brunner Face of Night 212: You figure it’s Richards, that’s why you got hot pants.
1972		G.V. Higgins Friends of Eddie Coyle 65: I’m not going to screw it up just because your people’ve got hot pants.

5. a term of address to a sexually eager woman (or one who is seen as such).

1963–74

B. Humphries Barry McKenzie [comic strip] in Complete Barry McKenzie (1988) 49: How about a refill — hot pants!