happy adj.
drunk.
Gent.’s Mag. 559: To express the condition of an Honest Fellow, and no Flincher, under the Effects of good Fellowship, it is said that he is [...] Happy. | ||
‘Diary of a Sporting Oxonian’ in Sporting Mag. Nov. XV 87/2: . |
In compounds
1. (S.Afr.) wine sold in 2½- or 5-litre (4½–8¾-pint) containers, placed in a cardboard box.
Cape Times 27 Oct. 5: First it was the ‘happy box’, the five-litre bag-in-box wine package that swept the wine trade some time ago, now it’s the instant refill [DSAE]. | ||
Dealers’ Daughters 102: The usual cask [...] was missing from the top of the piano [...] ‘Where’s your happy box?’ she asked [DSAE]. | ||
Boxed Wine Spot 9 Sept. [blog] This is just all about boxed wine. Whether you call it ‘boxed wine’, ‘box wine’, ‘wine-in-a-box’, ‘bag in box wine’, ‘BIB wine’, ‘BNB wine’, ‘cask wine’, a ‘happy box’, or a ‘party box’. | ||
Tonight 9 Oct. 🌐 The ‘happy box’ is the perfect wine storage method for somebody who likes an occasional glass without having to go to the trouble of opening a bottle. |
2. attrib. use of sense 1.
Grocott’s Mail (S.Afr.) 24 May 9: You will be assured of a glass of wine, on the house nogal — a really good vintage happy box variety [DSAE]. |
(drugs) a marijuana cigarette.
Semi-Tough 51: I’m bringin’ in more pounds of barbecue and Scotch and them funny little old cigarettes than you have ever dreamed about . | ||
Queens’ Vernacular 95: I wants t’get gone, honey; so pass me that funny cigarette. | ||
Boston Globe (MA) 10 May 269/2: That looks like a pack of Luckies [...] but you have actually put in a few funny cigarettes that male you feel all nice and easy. | ||
Marihuana Dict. | ||
Mercury Retrograde 38: A rolled up happy cigarette pressed between my world history pages. | ||
ONDCP Street Terms 11: Happy cigarette — Marijuana cigarette. | ||
Ten Storey Love Song 123: [A]fter a few Happy Fags he can’t be fussed and [...] just slouches. |
anti-depressants.
Changing Times (Wash., DC) Oct. 24/2: Often, depressed persons become even more depressed in their calm states following drug therapy. Some have even been known to attempt suicide under the influence of happy drugs. | ||
All Night Stand 167: Faro went out first that night, filled with happy-drugs, managers and promoters beaming about him. | ||
US News & World Report 76 172: Most of them make you feel relaxed— they’re happy drugs. And this is the irony: We condemn our children when they use these drugs on the street, yet the medical profession is handing them out like candy. | ||
Mother Jones Sept. 32/2: ‘Besides, there may be some time off work in the deal or, at the very least, some get-happy drugs.’ Time off work? Get-happy drugs? I didn't see much need for either. | ||
Frequently Asked Questions about Antidepressants 13: Antidepressants are ‘happy pills’ or ‘happy drugs.’ Fact: Antidepressants are not chemically related to drugs like amphetamines (“uppers”) or to illegal drugs that cause users to initially feel happy. |
1. (orig. US drugs) cocaine; thus happy duster, a cocaine user or seller.
Public Health Bull. 55-61 266: Happy dust. See Cocaine. | ||
Nat. Drug Clerk 2 281: Some of them call it ‘snow,’ ‘happy dust,’ etc. and you will hear them talk about taking a sleigh ride. | ||
Everybody’s Mag. 31 276/2: Officers discovered that the broad strip of braid forming the binding of the edges contained something that felt like sawdust, and on ripping this open poured out a full ounce of the ‘happy dust’ — about one thousand average doses. | ||
New York Day by Day 3 June [synd. col.] Possibly you do not known what a snow-bird is? Some call them ‘happy-dusters’ and others ‘sleigh-bells.’ They are the cocaine fiends of Broadway. | ||
Jargon Book 16: Happy Dust – Cocaine. | ||
Pulp Fiction (2007) 351: ‘Walk in a snow storm, brother?’ ‘It’s dope, isn’t it?’ [...] ‘Happy dust. Have some?’. | ‘Perfect Crime’ in Penzler||
Black Candle 10: The snuffers of cocaine are frequently designated as ‘happy-dusters’. | ||
Porgy (1945) 57: He poured a little pile of white powder into it [...] ‘Happy dus’!’ she said. | ||
John Henry 212: Maybe de happy dust cross me up and de preacher put me in de dozens. | ||
Criminal Sl. (rev. edn). | ||
AS XXVII:1 26: HAPPY DUST, n. Cocaine. | ‘Teen-age Hophead Jargon’ in||
Traffic In Narcotics 309: happy duster. An addict who sniffs cocaine up his nostrils. Also a peddler of cocaine. | ||
World’s Toughest Prison 802: happy dust – Cocaine. | ||
Tales of the City (1984) 39: Sportin’ Life [...] Happy dust. This stuff is an American institution. | ||
Lowspeak. | ||
in N.Y. Times 5 Mar. 🌐 As the lights go up in a dingy square of Catfish Row [...] you see a teeming street: rowdy men playing craps and picking fights, women hassling their husbands, wet clothes hanging, peddlers selling honey, crabs and ‘happy dust.’. |
2. heroin.
War Terror 261: ‘Happy dust,’ he answered briefly. ‘Happy dust?’ I repeated, looking at him a moment in doubt as to whether he was joking or serious. ‘What is that?’ ‘The Tenderloin name for heroin — a comparatively new derivative of morphine.’. | ||
Inside Dope 46: Now an instructed Bowery and Loop clamoured for this variety of ‘happy dust’ as possessing double the kick of ‘coke’. | ||
Criminal Sl. (rev. edn). | ||
Narcotics Lingo and Lore. | ||
(con. early 1950s) Valhalla 228: Kayo-san, Dallas’ junkie girl, who, either through an overdose of her happy dust or a bad fix [...] sang out with a banshee scream. |
3. morphine.
AS IV:5) 341: Happy dust—Morphine. | ‘Vocab. of Bums’ (in||
Amer. Tramp and Und. Sl. 95: Happy Dust.–Cocaine or any other powdered narcotic. | ||
Narcotics Lingo and Lore. |
1. marijuana.
Und. Speaks n.p.: Happy gas, mariahuana [sic]. |
2. (US) heroin.
Neon Wilderness 250: Lay off the happy-gas. | ||
Man with the Golden Arm 323: Lay off that happy gas, Frankie. |
3. (US) laughing gas or nitrous oxide.
Chicago Dental Soc. Rev. 88 19: We introduce children to nitrous oxide by calling it ‘happy gas’. | ||
Gentle Dental 🌐 Does the thought of a dentist’s drill make you shiver? New laser technology offers pain-free tissue removal. It’s also effective in treating canker sores and sensitive teeth. Still a little nervous? To help you relax, we have nitrous oxide (happy gas). | ||
See You in My Dreams 95: ‘Did he give you happy gas?’ Tasha asked. ‘Who?’ ‘Duh. The dentist.’. |
(US drugs) marijuana.
Winnipeg Trib. (Manitoba) 15 Sept. 9/1: [N]ames applied to a marijuana cigarette [are] ‘reefers,’ ‘happy grass,’ ‘loco-weed’. | ||
Slick Revenge 129: Four niggers, smoking that happy grass, might decide that they can fly, know what I mean? | ||
Runnin’ Down Some Lines 171: Marijuana is identified in terms of the effect it produces (joy, happy grass). | ||
K. Redd Da Mission 16: Fa ole time sake, git'chu, git'chu a lil hit of dis Happy Grass, den [...] pass it on down da line, Man! Don't Bo-Guard it. |
(Aus. drugs) cannabis.
Trancenet.org News 🌐 The familiar smell of very happy herb would sometimes waft out of the open door, and their behavior was becoming notorious. | ||
Age (Melbourne) 20 Jan. 🌐 They (young people) seem to see it as the ‘happy herb’; that it does no harm. They don’t understand that not only is it bad but it can introduce then to a tobacco habit as well. |
(US) good humour, usu. resulting from alcohol or drug intoxication.
(con. 1918–19) Beginning of Wisdom 290: He was too full of happy-juice. | ||
Rumble on the Docks (1955) 56: Pass on some of that happy juice to Sad Sack. |
a tranquillizer or stimulant.
Catholic Digest 21 13: The American Psychiatric association, appalled by the nature of the ‘happy-pill’ ballyhoo, recently issued a warning to the general public. | ||
West Coast Stories 138: He swallowed a whole bottle of happiness pills. | ‘Wheelbarrow and the Whirlwind’ in Drake-Brockman||
Fantastic Voyage 11: You’ve got that tranquillizer gleam in your eye, doctor. I don’t need any happy pills. | ||
US Congress Hearings by Committee on Education and Labor 391: Our children are turning to the happy pills, in an agony of disappointment and distrust. | ||
Acid Dreams 189: Another doctor soon put him on ‘happy pills,’ although these drugs did not seem to cheer Ruby up. | ||
Pitiless Parodies 74: Happy pills! Crammed with crazy chemicals that give all kinds of thrills! | ||
Brown Bread in Wengen [ebook] They upped her dose of happy pills. | ||
Nature Girl 60: No mixing booze with the happy pills. Doctor’s orders. | ||
Locked Ward (2013) 20: Various happy pills were doled out —and a few biffs of the liquid cosh. |
1. cocaine.
Killer in the Rain (1964) 223: He looked at me and shrugged. ‘Maybe it’s happy powder,’ he said. ‘Maybe he peddles a little of that.’. | ||
Criminal Sl. (rev. edn). | ||
Traffic In Narcotics 309: happy powder. [...] cocaine. | ||
For Love Alone 408: You didn’t happen to sniff some happy powder in there, did you? | ||
ONDCP Street Terms 11: Happy powder — Cocaine. | ||
Fatal Curiosity 20: He had tried to skim some of the white happy powder for himself and had gotten caught. | ||
Collision 186: I did travel with my ‘happy powder’ – no drug-sniffing airport dogs in those days [...] My happy powder was intended, so I thought; to make me the hippest kid on the block. |
2. heroin; morphine.
Criminal Sl. (rev. edn). | ||
Traffic In Narcotics 309: happy powder. Morphine [...] or heroin. | ||
Washingtonian 6 83: The ‘hophead’ traded the toaster for one cap of ‘happy powder’. | ||
Global Connection 170: Young children [...] may not realize that it is heroin they are using, and are deceived into starting by pushers describing it as happy powder or rainbow dust. |
(US black) a liquor store.
(con. 1940s) JiveOn.com 🌐 ABC (American Business College):n. A retail establishment specializing in the distribution of alcoholic beverages to the masses; See Happy Shack. | ‘The Jive Bible’ at
(US black) a liquor store.
Hy Lit’s Unbelievable Dict. of Hip Words 20: happy shop – Booze store. | ||
Third Ear n.p.: happy shop n. liquor store. |
(US) a home-made cosh.
Finders Keepers (2016) 152: He pulls his Happy Slapper from his coat pocket. The Slapper is a knotted sock [...] the sock’s foot is loaded with ball bearings. |
(US) a sock into which one masturbates.
Shore Leave 82: Devon got his happy sock, so he alright. Devon you know you go into port you got to leave your happy sock behind?’. |
(US) the clitoris.
Back to the Dirt 24: Jimmy Suicide snickered. ‘You lick your mama’s happy spot with that mouth before or after you talk filthy to her like that?’. |
1. marijuana.
Monkey On My Back (1954) 183: Then they tried happy sticks and bennies. Getting goofed once in a while was okay. | ||
Permanent Midnight 335: I’d woken up at four and smoked a couple of happy-sticks. | ||
Poetry Stew 120: Car loaded, the teens pile in – Equipped with road pops, munchies and happy sticks, their adventure begins. The time 4:20. |
2. marijuana laced with phencyclidine or cocaine.
cited in Sl. and Jargon of Drugs and Drink (1986). | ||
Still Point 113: They’re selling Happy Sticks, marijuana dipped in PCP. | ||
Living through Pop 122: A popular high was ‘happy sticks’: cannabis joints dipped in PCP (angel dust), providing manic energy for the user. | ||
ONDCP Street Terms 11: Happy Sticks — PCP. | ||
This Road I Walk 137: They smoked the happy sticks, cocaine-laced joints. | ||
Altered State 17: There was a juice bar because it was illegal to serve liquor in underground clubs [...] There was a lot of PCP [phencyclidine, or Angel Dust], happy sticks [joints dipped in PCP] and a lot of acid. Ecstasy was really big. |
(US) cocaine.
Black Cop 84: Wilson is always right there on time with the happy stuff. Ain’t that right, kid? |
SE in slang uses
In compounds
1. (UK Und.) the bag in which a shotgun is carried on an armed robbery; the gun makes the victim ‘happy’ to pass over his money.
A Few Kind Words and a Loaded Gun 13: Danny volunteered to deposit the happy-bag in the slaughter. | ||
Gun Law 196: Mr Glenn was trying to ascertain whether a ‘happy bag’ had been spotted. A happy bag is something their team keeps its robbery kit - guns, masks, tape - in. | ||
Raiders 11: Tony took the happy-bag containing the sawn-off. |
2. (US) the scrotum [bag n.1 (1a)].
Plainclothes Naked (2002) 97: We go over, show her we’re serious, and walk out with Georgie’s happy-bag and the mayor’s kisser. |
(US campus) one who is perfectly satisfied with their life and the circumstances in which they find themselves; also as negative, not a happy camper, a dissatisfied, unhappy person; the deliberate levity of the phrase often hides a genuinely deep unhappiness or dissatisfaction.
Campus Sl. Mar. 5: happy camper – one characterized by elation. | ||
Skull Session 446: You’re going to be a very happy camper afterward. | ||
Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nightdress 88: He is not a happy camper. | ||
(con. 1980s) Skagboys 193: The beggar Boy isnae a happy camper. |
a female Salvationist.
Cornishman 13 May 3/3: ‘Happy Eliza’ [...] has been assailed in the streets with stones, rotten fish, and ‘rotten everything’. | ||
broadside ballad: They call me Happy Eliza, and I’m Converted Jane / We’ve been two hot ’uns in our time. | ||
Dead Bird (Sydney) 14 Dec. 4/1: He is less careful in his speech now than when he [...] punched the drum side by side with Happy Eliza in the Army. | ||
Pall Mall Gaz. 15 Dec. 7/1: Happy Eliza’s name became a household word [...] she was the very type and embodiment of the Salvation Army spirit. | ||
Cornishman 14 May 5/7: Happy Eliza; a sketch. | ||
Truth (Melbourne) 9 Jan. 2/4: This is Happy Eliza, / The Salvos all prize her. | ||
Nottingham Eve. Post 12 Apr. 4/1: A notable Salvationist officer has passed away [...] As a young girl she saw an announcement that ‘Happy Eliza’ and Major Reynolds [...] would ‘open fire’ in Sneiton Market. She was at once interested and later joined the army. |
(US) a massage that concludes with masturbation of the male client.
Patriot-News (Harrisburg, PA) 6 Aug. A9/5: One of Soderbergh’s plot lines, a massage with a ‘happy ending,’ was already featured on two HBO shows, Larry David’s and ‘Mind of the Married Man.’. | ||
Embodied Tensions 121: Some therapists still perform sexual services, typically masturbation, by performing what is known as a ‘happy ending’ massage. | ||
L.A. Adventures 75: This is not an oil on skin massage, and it’s not a happy-ending massage either, despite the rumors. | ||
Guardian 5 July 🌐 He gives intimate ‘Loving Touch’ massages. Or what we might call Happy Endings. | in||
Adventures of the Honey Badger [ebook] [T]his old lady [...] lifts up my shirt, scrunches up some leaves and rubs them on my chest, armpits, and feet. Is this what is meant by a ‘happy ending’. | ||
🌐 ‘What are you doing here? I thought you were getting a happy hula-hula ending’. | ‘Hula Hula Boys’ in What Pluckery Is This? (28 Jan 2024)
(US) a psychiatric institution.
Real Bohemia xv: happy farm mental hospital. |
a psychiatric institution.
🎵 They’re coming to take me away ho ho hee hee ha haaa / To the happy home with trees and flowers and chirping birds. | ‘They’re coming to take me away’||
Bulletin of the N.Y. Academy of Medicine 204: A few years later his [i.e. Ezra Pound] come-uppance was somewhat longer than a mere weekend in the ‘happy house’. | ||
Only Fools and Horses [TV script] She’s as nutty as a fruit cake. She spends most of her time in the Happy Home. | ‘Wanted’
1. death.
Last of Mohicans (1831) 400: A young man has gone to the happy hunting grounds. | ||
Life in the Far West (1849) 135: After a long journey, they will reach the happy hunting-grounds. | ||
Bulletin (Sydney) 30 May 6/3: John Pearson, […] lately deceased, was what may be termed a ‘funeral crank,’ nevertheless he was pretty level-headed. When John found that he was on the eve of departure for the happy hunting grounds, he sat himself down to dispose of his property, and [...] to make arrangements for his own funeral. | ||
Miss Nobody of Nowhere 57: Old Mescal is now keeping a sharp eye out for the child and the cowboy, that he may send them to the happy hunting-grounds also. | ||
Carrying On 5: Ogg and Hogg [...] have gone to the happy hunting-grounds. | ||
Fighting Caravans (1992) 114: I found four Injuns alive yet, so I sent them off to the Happy Huntin’-grounds. |
2. the vagina.
Sl. and Its Analogues. |
(Aus.) the act of vomiting.
Sl., Jargon and Cant I 448/1: Happy returns (Australian popular), throwing up one’s food. If a person feels sick [...] he will say that ‘he has the happy returns.’. | in Barrère & Leland||
I Travelled a Lonely Land (1957) 234/1: happy returns – vomit. |
(N.Z. prison) a makeshift weapon made by tying batterinto a sock.
Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] 84/2: happy sack n. a weapon made from batteries in a sock. |
a bisexual.
eye mag. 8 July 🌐 Secretly, though, he was a bit of a happy shopper. | ‘A dirty little story’ in||
Roger’s Profanisaurus 3 in Viz 98 Oct. 17: Happy Shopper 1 n. prop. A cheap ’n’ cheerless grocery brand. 2. n. A bisexual — one who shops on both sides of the street. |
(US) a line of chest hair down the middle of a man’s torso leading to the penis.
🌐 I have more hair on my happy trail than on my happy place. | posting 24 Jul. on ‘What should I do about body hair’ at Spankmag.com||
🌐 gotta love that treasure trail. | posting 24 Jul. on ‘What should I do about body hair’ at Spankmag.com||
🌐 snail trail a.k.a. the divine line? I like them because I have one. They’re cool. | posting 24 Jul. on ‘What should I do about body hair’ at Spankmag.com
1. (Aus.) an area of shantytowns.
in | ( 1999) 98: When your hair has turned to silver / I will still be on the ‘dole’ /And we’ll live in Happy valley / When the ‘reds’ have got control.||
Lingo 97: happy valleys sprang up. They were shantytowns of cardboard, tin, and anything else that the unemployed could scavenge to build a shelter for their families. |
2. the female genitals.
5000 Adult Sex Words and Phrases. |
3. (US gay) the cleft of the buttocks.
Queens’ Vernacular 103: happy valley the cleft separating the right buttock cheek from the left; [...] Related terms: ski up and down Happy Valley (late ’60s) to rub the cock in between and over the buttocks of the partner. |
(US) a prison or police van.
WELS. | ||
Meanwhile, Back at the Front (1962) 13: The squad of marines reached the Happy Wagon. | ||
Dragon Slayer 100: You [...] had better come in before the neighbors call the happy wagon to come and cart you away. |
In phrases
(US black) superficial.
N.Y. Amsterdam News 17 Jan. 21: An operator referred to one of her clients as a ‘happy-headed so and so’. |