Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. uninterested in, not wanting; also used as adv. with another prep. (e.g. off of/with).

1699		Farquhar Love and a Bottle II i: By the Circumstances of my Body I shall soon be off or on with her.
1707		Cibber Double Gallant I i: What! Then you are quite off of the Lady, I suppose, that you made an Acquaintance with in the Park last Week.
1889		Music Hall & Theatre Rev 6 Apr. 121/1: But, thank goodness, you have the pluck to wear your own pretty dark hair. l am right off the common or garden serio-comic fair wig.
1905		Aus. Town and Country Jrnl 3 May 16/4: The most curious slang in the world is that of South Africa. [...] If he suspects that the play at the ‘gaff’ (theatre) is poor, he is ‘dead off’ going.
1906		E. Dyson Fact’ry ’Ands 190: Feathers was the real sufferer. In his own language, he was ‘off ther Dolly’.
1919		H.C. Witwer Smile A Minute 300: I am pinched and fined $100 and Jeanne is off me for a week.
1920		F.S. Fitzgerald This Side of Paradise in Bodley Head Scott Fitzgerald III (1960) 103: They’re rather off you at the club, you know; every man that doesn’t come through makes our crowd just so much weaker.
1927		H.C. Witwer Classics in Sl. 12: She’s off the boys for life, plays football and takes boxin’ lessons, instead of obligin’ at the piano and knittin’ doilies.
1930		W.R. Burnett Iron Man 8: I’m off of cards.
1934		Wodehouse Right Ho, Jeeves 123: Girlish banter be dashed. She’s right off me.
1958		(con. 1940s) B. Behan Borstal Boy 25: What’s the matter [...] off your grub or something?
1967		K. Amis letter 23 Oct. in Leader (2000) 10: I hope you don’t think I’m off the idea of Eng. Lit.
2011		S.J. Watson Before I Go to Sleep 259: ‘He said you were arguing, more than ever, and he didn’t know what to do. You were off sex, too’.

2. (drugs) not using an addictive drug, usu. narcotic; also of alcohol.

1919		‘Bartimeus’ ‘Narrative of Commander W.D. Hornby’ in Awfully Big Adventure 120: He pointed to a tin of cigarettes with a wry face. ‘Dead off baccy,’ he said.
1929		D. Parker ‘The Last Tea’ in Penguin Dorothy Parker (1982) 182: I’m off the stuff for life.
1938		D. Maurer ‘Lang. of the Und. Narcotic Addict’ Pt 2 in Lang. Und. (1981) 106/2: To Be off. Var. of To Be off drugs. To be temporarily freed from the habit.
1949		‘Josephine Tey’ Brat Farrar 207: ‘He’s distinctly off her. And he’s not awfully enamoured of you, if it comes to that’.
1952		‘Hal Ellson’ Golden Spike 104: ‘You mean you’re off it?’ ‘Yeah, off it, I’m kicking it.’.
1963		‘Nino Culotta’ Gone Fishin’ 207: He’s gone orf the grog. Says she don’t like the smell of it on his breath.
1966		J. Mills Panic in Needle Park (1971) 15: When they are off heroin, addicts tend to be morose and restless. On heroin, when they are straight, they are pleasant, gentle, likeable.
1973		P. Maas Serpico 179: He had been an addict when he was turned into an informant, and was supposedly off heroin now.
1993		I. Welsh Trainspotting 170: ah wis the fackin cunt tryin tae git um oaf it!
2000		Observer Mag. 11 June 12: I’m off everything now.
2010		K. Richards Life 260: I would have probably written ‘Gimme Shelter’ whether i was on or off the stuff.

3. (orig. US) by means of, e.g. Sarah was grooving off Belle and Sebastian.

1964		B. Jackson Get Your Ass in the Water (1974) 146: The whores got high off a good cocaine / and stood on the corners and boast.
1965		W. King ‘The Game’ in King Black Short Story Anthol. (1972) 309: We played it cool, since we were eating off him; never can tell how a stud takes to being laughed at.
1999		K. Sampson Powder 436: She’s buzzin’ off all of this.