Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. to waste time, to fool around, to wander off the subject, to distract someone’s attention; thus messing n. [epitomized in Kenneth Williams’s (1926–88) catchphrase Stop messing about! used in various Kenneth Horne BBC radio comedy shows and in the UK Carry On... films (1950s–80s)].

1884		Ally Sloper’s Half Holiday 24 May 25/1: I don’t mean to mess about. The whole half-dollar goes on one horse.
1896		E. Pugh Man of Straw 13: ‘Put it down, Mister Ike,’ she said. ‘Don’t mess about.’ He laughed in her face, extended his arm, and dropped the water-bottle on the floor.
1912		Bulletin (Sydney) 18 July 47/2: You put on as much dog as a bloomin’ king! Wot’s ’appened to yer moter-car that you’re messin’ round in my cab?
1932		J.L. Kuethe ‘Johns Hopkins Jargon’ in AS VII:5 334: mess around — to ‘kill time’; to interfere; to meddle.
1949		Wodehouse Mating Season 13: Messing about in the parish and getting up village concerts.
1956		R. Ellison ‘A Coupla Scalped Indians’ in King Black Short Story Anthol. (1972) 271: What you doing messing ’round in my yard?
1961		T. Taylor Baron’s Court All Change (2011) 145: ‘Now I want it straight, do you hear? No messing!’.
1963		Dundes & Schonhorn ‘Kansas University Sl.: A New Generation’ in AS XXXVIII:3 170: Wasting time: messing around.
1971		H.E. Roberts Third Ear n.p.: mess around v. to engage in a great deal of purposeless activity.
1978		R. Charles Brother Ray 110: [T]here were as many people hanging out backstage, listening to us rehearse and mess around, as out front.
1989		M. Amis London Fields 108: Short legs were shortcuts . . . Yeah. They didn’t mess about. Short legs were shortcuts to the biz.
1993		R. Doyle Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha 8: If a teacher caught five fellas smoking or doing serious messing he got a bonus in his wages.
2007		B. Coleman Check the Technique 22: ‘[S]ometimes we wouldn’t get anything done for a whole week, because we’d be messing around’.

2. to indulge in varying degrees of sexual intimacy, usu. adulterously.

1896		Farmer Vocabula Amatoria (1966) 32: Batifoler. To ‘mess about’.
1899		R. Whiteing No. 5 John Street 218: If I ever ketch yer messin’ abaht wi’ any o’ them, I’ll sling ’im one in the eye.
1906		E. Pugh Spoilers 88: Come to that, what you want to go messin’ about wi’ the gel at all for?
1923		Alberta Hunter ‘Aggravatin’ Papa’ 🎵 Listen while I get you told, / Stop messin’ round with my jellyroll.
1937		R. Westerby Wide Boys Never Work (1938) 158: I haven’t been messing around with your missus.
1937		J. Curtis There Ain’t No Justice 114–5: How you come to let a bastard like him mess you about beats me.
1947		C. Willingham End as a Man (1952) 146: I’m not so hard up I have to mess around with a hare-lipped hag.
1957		H. Simmons Corner Boy 85: Tell her not to come crying around here when she gets all bigged from messing around with you.
1963		C. Wood ‘Prisoner and Escort’ in Cockade (1965) I iii: But I wasn’t on the game properly – never took money ... I just messed about.
1974		D. Mamet Sexual Perversity in Chicago (1994) 76: You mean like ‘messing’ around with other boys?
1986		F. Taylor Auf Wiedersehen Pet Two 266: If you mess around with her and bollix things up for the rest of us [...] I’ll give you more than a flash.
1997		G. Sikes 8 Ball Chicks (1998) 159: He messed behind my back when I was pregnant. I got a disease. Chlamydia.
2000		C. Cook Robbers (2001) 16: Back in the old days, your old lady mess around you could shoot her, no questions asked. Crime of passion.
2012		D. Spivey ‘If You Were Only White’ 173: There were those who were faithful married men who did not mess around.

3. to handle roughly, to mistreat, to swindle, to deceive.

1902		Bulletin (Sydney) 4 Oct. 35/2: I reckon Bogan had thirty or forty pairs of eyes watching out for him in case he’d run against something or fall. It irritated him to be messed round too much; he said a baby would never learn to walk if it was held all the time.
1914		Truth (Melbourne) 10 Jan. 7/5: Some fellows [...] offered me £2 to let the thing drop, but they kept messing me about, and in the end I got nothing.
1917		‘Sapper’ No Man’s Land 298: The men despise vacillation and chopping and changing. Being ‘messed about,’ they call it, only the word is not messed.
1921		D.L. Sayers Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club (1977) 129: I quite see that you can’t mess about with the Home Office.
1946		J.E. Dadswell Hey, Sucker 198: Looky here, boss, we ain’t going to mess you around none or tear down the joint, but just give us back our passes.
1958		R. Prather Scrambled Yeggs 111: If he messed around long enough, he could get us all killed.
1960		H. Pinter Caretaker Act III: Well, nobody messes me about for long.
1965		E. Bond Saved Scene viii: I ain’ goin’ a be messed around over this!
1976		P. Theroux Family Arsenal 65: These rich people – they’re messing the other ones about, and like the other ones don’t have anything.
1985		T.R. Houser Central Sl. 36: mess around To engage in illegal activity [...] ‘No way, man, I don’t mess around.’.
1989		(con. 1982–6) T. Williams Cocaine Kids (1990) 48: When Masterrap missed an appointment with his girlfriend he came back to the apartment and said he wanted a ‘hit’ because the girl was ‘messing him around’.
1995		J. Cameron Vinnie Got Blown Away 6: You know them up Chingford George. Mess you around.
1999		Guardian G2 8 Oct. 18: No one messes ’im and me abaht. Tomorrow night we’ll ’ave a word and they’ll be sorted.
2000		T. Blacker Kill Your Darlings 219: Don’t mess me about now, Greg.
2000		Guardian Guide 1–6 Jan. 44: You have to ring round for them and then wait all night for people to mess you around.
2014		T. Black Artefacts of the Dead [ebook] You think you can mess me about, you’re in for a shock.
2021		C. Hammer Opal Country 237: [J]ust got messed around and frustrated, run around by someone else’s agenda.

4. (US black) to dance.

1928		Pine Top Smith ‘Pine Top’s Boogie Woogie’ 🎵 When I say git it, want you all to mess around.
1935		Cleo Brown ‘Pinetop’s Boogie Woogie’ 🎵 When I tell you to hold it this time, I don’t want you to move a peg. / And when I tell you to get it, I want you to mess around!

5. to be involved with.

1942		N. Algren Never Come Morning (1988) 67: Barber’s just givin’ him kid stuff t’ do to keep him from messin’ around the big stuff.
1965		H. Williamson Hustler 36: I messed around with those guys [i.e. criminal accomplices] off and on until I went to jail for the first time. Later on I came back to them again.

6. to spend time with, to socialize.

1968		J. Hersey Algiers Motel Incident 87: I used to mess around with Herbert [...] then we sort of drifted apart, and I got to be friends with Fred.
1978		R. Charles Brother Ray 23: My old friends were all there [...] These were the kids who always messed around with me, even before I went blind.

7. (US drugs) to take a narcotic drug.

1970		G. Cain Blueschild Baby 131: ‘Still messing around? I’m doing something.’ ‘What you got?’ ‘Deuces.’ ‘Got some place I can get off?’.
2021		T. Swerdlow Straight Dope [ebook] — [Y]ou done messed around. — That ain’t got nothing to do with it. — That always got something to do it.

8. to assault sexually.

1975

Sepe & Telano Cop Team 73: My sister [...] was messed around with by some dirty beast.