grease n.1
1. in fig. uses.
(a) money, esp. when given as a bribe or paid as protection money [grease v.1 (1)].
![[UK]](/static/img/flags/uk.png "United Kingdom") | Cataplus 49: In these precincts liv’d Justice of peace / That never had palm lickt with grease. | |
| Woman Turn’d Bully I ii: tru.: I will take in my Mortgage within two days. [...] dock.: Oh, farewell Huff, if y’are so impatient. Go, spend your grease, vain Fop. | |
| Dict. of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, etc. 91: Grease — a bonus given to promote the cause of any one, as Grease to a cart-wheel. | |
| Modern Flash Dict. | |
| Flash Mirror 20: If any of my knabbs will lay out ready grease, he pawns himself to serve them rummy. | |
| Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open. | |
| Leaves from Diary of Celebrated Burglar 131/1: They knew from the time Joe and I kept the Two Guns, and well they might, considering the ‘grease’ we ‘slung’ them. | |
![[US]](/static/img/flags/us.png "United States") | Sl. Dict. (1890) 16: Grease. A bribe. | |
| Bluefield Daily Tel. (WV) 8 Jan. 2/1: Money has more synonyms than any word in the English language [...] There is in use coin, plunks, plasters, soap, rocks, dust, dough, [...] grease, bones, balsam, chicken feet [sic], rhino, brass, gold and on and on. | |
| Lima (OH) News 5 June 6/3: Coins are called [...] ‘palm grease’. | |
| It’s a Racket! 226: grease — Bribe money. | |
| ‘Gats in the Hat’ in Gun Molls Sept. 🌐 ‘What’s the matter; ain’t you getting enough grease?’ ‘Grease is all right on a little thing like smuggling and robbery [...] But murder is something else again!’. | |
| Thieves Slang ms list from District Police Training Centre, Ryton-on-Dunsmore, Warwicks 5: Grease: Bribe. | |
| ‘The Language of the Tennessee Mountain Regions’ in AS XIV:2 92: soap-grease. Any form of money. | |
| Criminal Sl. (rev. edn). | |
| Corruption City 75: He dished out the grease for the boss in thousand-dollar bills. | |
| Syndicate (1998) 99: He [...] threatened to let the syndicate in if the Big Boy didn’t come through with the grease. | |
| In La-La Land We Trust (1999) 25: Restaurants that once had plenty of trouble from the inspectors from the Health Department until Quon had learned how to spread the grease. | |
| Typical American (1998) 130: It’s called grease. This is how it is in America. Certain American palms require a certain American —. | |
| ONDCP Street Terms 11: Grease — Currency. | |
| Sun. Times Mag. 19 Dec. 62/1: The Liffey still smelt of Eurogrease and backhanders. |
(b) (also goose grease) flattery, persuasion.
| ‘Midshipman Jargon’ in AS III:6 453: Grease — Bluff. | |
| Night Club Era 161: It will be found that the policeman [. . .] laps up goose grease and even the cruder forms of blandishment. | |
| Bruiser 121: I put you on the grease a little in my story [...] I made you a great guy, Shane. | |
| Syndicate (1998) 22: Naida and Lilly had applied the grease to me in more ways than one. | |
| in Psychotic Reactions (1988) 237: It runs to almost everything the music business runs on: the hype, the grease, the glad-handing. |
(c) (US) political influence.
| ‘Some Annapolis Sl.’ in AS XIV:1 Feb. 77/1: He may try to use grease (pull) to achieve a high place. | |
| Fort Apache, The Bronx 165: Hey, Murphy, your brothers have a little grease downtown, don’t they? [...] Do you think they could pull me a transfer. | |
 | Wager 10: Anson did not wield the level of patronage, the grease—or ‘interest,’ as it was more politely called—that propelled many officers up the pole. |
2. in lit. uses.
(a) (orig. US campus, also grease pot) butter or margarine.
| ‘Camp Phrases’ in Chicago Trib. 11 Nov. 2: Mess beef is ‘salt horse,’ coffee is ‘boiled rye,’ vegetables are ‘cow feed,’ and butter ‘strong grease’. | |
| ’Sailors’ Lingo’ in Hants. Teleg. 21 Feb. 11/3: In speaking of butter ‘grease’ is the word used. | |
![[Aus]](/static/img/flags/aus.png "Australia") | West. Argus (Kalgoorlie, WA) 9 Dwec. n.p.: The ex-soldier requesting ‘Buck-shee-pozzi grease’ at tea-time merely desires another piece of bread and jam. | |
| Athenaeum 8 Aug. 727/2: When ‘gyppo’ or ‘grease’ was asked for at mealtimes, gravy or butter (?) was meant . | |
| ‘Johns Hopkins Jargon’ in AS VII:5 332: grease — butter. | |
| None But the Lonely Heart 283: Lump of bread and grease, pot of chah. | |
| Railroad Avenue 345: Railroad eating house [...] butter is grease pot. | |
| ‘Whisper All Aussie Dict.’ in Kings Cross Whisper (Sydney) xxxv 6/1: grease: Margarine or butter. | |
![[NZ]](/static/img/flags/nz.png "New Zealand") | Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. |
(b) (US drugs) opium [the viscosity of the drug].
| Wash. Post 11 Nov. Miscellany 3/5: Toledo was known as a ‘right town’ and a good place to hide out in with its numerous ‘scatters’ or dives where ‘hop’ or ‘grease’ was smoked. | |
| ‘Lang. of the Und. Narcotic Addict’ Pt 2 in Lang. Und. (1981) 103/2: grease. Smoking opium before it is rolled into pills. | |
| Narcotics Lingo and Lore. |
(c) (US Und.) nitroglycerine.
| Jackson Dly News (MS) 1 Apr. 7/2: Crook Chatter [...] ‘A good yegg or safe blower regards a “moll buzzer” as a vulgarian [...] A competenent “grease handler” thinks that working with anything but [...] nitroglycerin is beneath his digniy’. | |
| Keys to Crookdom 67: While in prison he learned how to use the nitroglycerin or ‘grease’ in moderation. | |
| Shadows of Men 76: Nitro was a past master at boiling dynamite. He would pour off the water and retain the oily substance [...] This was called ‘grease,’ or ‘soup’. | |
| Criminal Sl. (rev. edn). | |
| Men of the Und. 135: They dump three ounces of ‘grease’ into the aperture. | |
| Gonif 7: I had [...] grease to blow a hole if the chippers and saws encountered too much resistance. |
(d) vaginal secretions.
| Peeping Tom (London) 30 120/2: [a toast] ‘The well-greased rope that easily goes into the snatch-block’. | |
| Negro and His Songs (1964) 234: I et so much dat hog-eye grease, / Till de grease run out my nabel. / Run long home, Miss Hog-eye. | |
| [song title] I Want Plenty Grease In My Frying Pan. | |
| ‘You Can’t Get That Stuff No More’ 🎵 Li’l Suzanne she used to sell her grease / She got in trouble with the chief o’ police. |
(e) (US black/campus) a meal, food.
| Night Song (1962) 75: Look, man, can we take off our things and get some grease? | |
| ‘Razorback Sl.’ in AS L:1/2 60: grease n Meal, dinner. | |
| Secrets of Harry Bright (1986) 169: Let’s go get some grease. | |
| Permanent Midnight 55: We stumbled out at lunchtime to reup and grab a slab of grease. | |
| (con. 1964–8) Cold Six Thousand 149: Woody’s Club. Famous for all-nite grease. Renowned for fried everything food. | |
| What They Was 89: Dario loves his burgers, or as he calls it, his grease. |
(f) (gay) any form of lubricant – KY Jelly etc – that facilitates anal intercourse.
| Guild Dict. Homosexual Terms 19: grease (or k-y) (n.): The lubricant used in sexual intercourse of homosexuals. | |
| Queens’ Vernacular. | |
| Jailhouse Jargon and Street Sl. [unpub. ms.]. |
In derivatives
(Aus.) a payment (not necessarily a bribe).
| Truth (Sydney) 1 June 5/5: And them there private consultations / Means a greaser every pop. |
In compounds
1. (US gay) a lubricant to facilitate anal intercourse.
| Chicano Chicken 25: ‘Ass grease on room service?!’ [...] ‘Shit, yeah! You call get the bellhop [...] to smear it on if you want’. |
2. (US) semen, esp. in context of homosexual anal intercourse.
| personal ad in restroom in Murray & Murrell Lang. Sadomasochism (1989) 34: For an endless supply of ass grease (no S and M, yes B and D) call [phone number]. |
1. (US) a bribe.
| Criminal Sl. (rev. edn). |
2. (US) insincere flattery.
| Amer. Thes. Sl. | |
| ‘Lang. of Men’ in Advertisements for Myself (1961) 123: You should have seen the grease job I gave to Carter. | |
| Choice of Weapons 145: ‘That was a real grease job, Brother Bill,’ I said happily, ‘but you laid it on kinda thick about the welcoming speech’. |
3. anal intercourse using Vaseline, KY Jelly or a similar lubricant.
| Naked Lunch (1968) 174: I’ll bet she needs a grease job worst way. | |
| Exit 3 and Other Stories 120: If you want a woman take ole Theodora into town for a grease job. |
(US Und.) a safe-blower, who uses nitroglycerine.
| Gonif 7: I was considered one of the top grease men in the country. |
(W.I.) a bribe.
![[WI]](/static/img/flags/wi.png "West Indies") | cited in Dict. Jam. Eng. (1980). |
1. (US drugs) anywhere a drug seller sets up their business.
| Narcotics Lingo and Lore. |
2. see also SE compounds below.
1. see sense 2a above.
2. see also SE compounds below.
In phrases
to smoke opium.
| Traffic In Narcotics 310: hit the grease [...] To use opium as a drug in any way. |
(US) in serious trouble.
| in Zwilling TAD Lex. (1993) 67: Yessing a retired captain who saw service as he puts the hick officers in the grease at a party. | |
| Hollywood Girl 21: We call it the Pan American because we’re always putting somebody in the grease. | |
| None But the Lonely Heart 102: If the police copped Him down there, He was proper in the dripping. | |
| ‘Dead Man’s Guilt’ Dan Turner – Hollywood Detective May 🌐 His testimony will put me in the grease when the law starts asking questions. |
smoking opium.
| Narcotics Lingo and Lore. |
see under swim v.
SE in slang uses
In compounds
see separate entries.
(US) a very greasy or unappetizing hamburger; also attrib.
| ‘High Dice’ in Gentleman Junkie 88: It was just as easy to take strychnine as eat his greaseburgers. | |
| City of Night 26: I ask for the most expensive steak, still remembering the greaseburgers. | |
| Way Past Cool 29: Spendin the rest of they goddam lifes workin in one of them grease-bomb factories. | |
| How to Ride a Motorcycle 24/2: Mental mistakes like [...] assuming another motorist is paying attention to you and not his double-bacon greaseburger. |
(US) a cook.
| ‘Argot of the Vagabond’ in AS II:9 392: A cook is a grease-burner, stew-builder or mulligan-mixer. | |
| World’s Toughest Prison 793: burner – A cook. |
an automatic weapon.
| (con. 1943–5) To Hell and Back (1950) 214: One of our machine guns answers. A grease gun whirrs. | |
| Shook-Up Generation (1961) 35: It had Mausers, a grease gun, ‘some kind of a machine gun’ and a sawn-off shotgun. | |
| Spook who Sat by the Door (1972) 112: In addition to M-1’s there were grease guns, pistols, M-14 and M-16 rifles. | |
| [ | | Dispatches 11: He was laughing and taping a bunch of sixteen clips together bottom to bottom for faster reloading, ‘grease.’]. |
| (con. c.1970) Short Timers (1985) 106: Cowboy hands me a grease gun. | |
| (con. 1967) Welcome to Vietnam (1989) 55: I carry real heat in the field. M-16, shotgun, or grease gun. |
(US) a derog. term for a Mexican or Mexican-American.
| in Current Sl. IV:3–4 (1970). | |
| Maledicta VII 29: Mexicans were also called grease gut, grease boy, and oiler. |
(US) a mechanic.
| (con. 1918) 639th Aero Squadron 52: Grease hounds [HDAS]. |
1. (also grease-garage) a cheap or inferior restaurant.
| ‘A Word List From Montana’ in DN IV:iii 244: grease joint, n. Eating house. ‘Let’s go to the grease joint and get something to eat.’. | |
| ‘The Big Knockover’ Story Omnibus (1966) 286: They took us to all the hangouts in San Francisco, to cabarets, grease-joints, pool-rooms, saloons, flophouses, hockshops [...] and what have you. | |
| ‘Good Luck is No Good’ in Federal Agent Nov. 🌐 if she ain’t slinging hash in some grease-jernt she’s out of place. | |
| ‘There’s Hicks In All Trades’ in All Sports Feb. 🌐 He is canvassing the town’s best grease-garage — Oxford for beanery — in search of some steaming coffee and perhaps a snack. | |
| Headless Lady (1987) 29: A grab joint is a hot-dog stand; a grease joint is a lunch wagon or stand; a juice joint the lemonade -. | |
| Sweet Thursday (1955) 90: Mrs. Malloy’s slinging hash in a grease joint. | |
| Walking the Beat 146: I go to this luncheonette where he hangs out. It’s a ptomaine joint. I order ham and eggs [...] and I eat slow. I want to eat fast ‘cause it’s a grease joint but I eat slow. | |
| Mortals All 61: Sees me’a grease joint just down street an’ heads dat way. Got me a plate’a chops wit onions an’ cheese an’ some tater fries. | |
| Red Sex, White Drugs, Blue Rock N Roll 9: I made it a habit of walking [...] to the local grease joint where they have air conditioning. |
2. a hamburger or hot dog stand.
| Barker 149: Grease joint – Hot sandwich stand. | |
| Amer. Tramp and Und. Sl. 91: Grease Joint. – [...] In show circles, a ‘hamburger’ or ‘hot dog’ stand. | |
| Hey, Sucker 87: Other interesting words in daily use are: [...] grease-joint for hamburger or hot dog stand. | |
| ‘The Ice Man Came’ in Thrilling Detective Winter 🌐 The cook in the grease joint said he’d gone over to town. [Ibid.] I went over to the grease joint [...] I finished the burger and coffee. |
a mechanic.
| Piloting the U.S. Mail 155: Bob glanced at his dirty coveralls and grinned. ‘Never mind,’ he said. ‘You’ll be a “grease monkey” yourself soon’. | |
| (con. 1917) ‘A Flier’s War’ in Longstreet Canvas Falcons (1970) 278: I was [...] waiting for the grease monkey to change a tire on the officers’-mess car. | |
| ‘Make with the Shape’ in Coll. Stories (1990) 111: Can’t be nothing the matter with it [i.e. a car] a good greasemonkey like me can’t fix. | |
| Walk on the Wild Side 192: Against the collar clan the lunch bucket brigadiers — [...] grease-monkeys, slaughter house bullies, plasterers and brick-layers didn’t stand a chance. | |
| Go, Man, Go! 16: Wants a guy who’s not a grease-monk. She’s running with one who’s bent over his car all the time. | |
| Meanwhile, Back at the Front (1962) 22: I am an artist, not a goddamn grease monkey. | |
| (con. 1916) Tin Lizzie Troop (1978) 172: He’d be back with grease monkey in another hour. | |
| From Bondage 268: Grease monkey working over a pit under a subway train. | |
| Bad Debts (2012) [ebook] That grease monkey rang. Says he took your motor to pieces and he can’t out it together again . | |
| Indep. Rev. 30 June 9: They traded their gringo grease monkey attire for wild print sarongs. | |
| Observer Rev. 9 Jan. 1: His character [...] was conceived as the grease-monkey mascot of the Sunshine Cab company garage. | |
| Mad mag. May 31: You’d make a good grease monkey. | |
| Bad Boy Boogie [ebook] ‘I told you about Tony. The mechanic?’ ‘You’re gonna be a grease monkey?’. | |
| Back to the Dirt 45: [S]he danced nude for any and all shade of suckers, swine, suits, and grease monkeys. | |
| Empty Wigs (t/s) 138: Bunny Dyde, quite a celebrated grease monkey in the days when motor racing was motor racing. |
a generic term for actors.
| Autobiog. of a Thief 35: I hobnobbed with ex- ‘pugs’ and ‘grease paint’ (actors), crooks and down-and-outs. |
1. (US) a cheap restaurant, a greasy spoon n.1 (1)
| New York Day by Day 24 Jan. [synd. col.] Most of them were employed in so-called grease parlors or dirty spoon restaurants of the Bowery and East Side. |
2. (US black) a hairdresser’s, a beauty parlour.
| House of Fury (1959) 118: Owned one of them grease parlors, had two or three girls workin’ there off an’ on, manicurin’, cuttin’ hair, bustin’ naps. |
(US prison) prison-cooked, chicken-fried steak.
| Prison Sl. 67: Grease Patties Chicken fried steak. |
1. an unpleasant place.
| letter 16 Feb. in Proud Highway (1997) 322: The cities are greasepits and not worth blowing off the map. |
2. a cheap restaurant.
| Hell’s Angels (1967) 194: Something like stoop labour, or a steady job in a grease pit. | |
| Llama Parlour 111: At night she did seedy gigs downtown or in pukesville grease-pits in the Valley. | |
| ‘Chickenhawk’ at www.cultdeadcow.com 🌐 Doris, the waitress at this overpriced greasepit gave me the evil eye. |
3. see also sl. compounds above.
1. a term of abuse.
| Boston Blade 10 June n.p.: Take our advice and quit the company of such a grease pot. | |
| Beyond Black 214: You oiky little greasepot, you’re just being hideous. |
2. (US) a cook, orig. and usu. in a prison or camp.
| ‘Navy Sl.’ in DN IV: ii 150: greasepot, n. A cook. | |
| Dict. Service Sl. n.p.: the greasepot . . . the cook. | |
| Hy Lit’s Unbelievable Dict. of Hip Words 49: grease pot – A cook. |
3. see also sl. compounds above.
(US) a mechanic.
| Troubling of a Star 47: The grease-pushers in the 66th didn’t have half the work with jets that Braith had with the piston engines. |
(UK) a mechanic working at a fair or amusement park.
| (con. 1960s) Caravans & Wedding Bands 108: Jill [...] was known as the [amusement] park ‘bike’, available to any of the grease-rags, the men who worked the machines. |
1. an infinitesimally tiny quantity; esp. the fig. state to which one is reduced after either losing a violent fight or suffering extremely hot weather.
| Exploits and Adventures 22: There was scarce enough left of him, after the canvass was over, to make a small grease spot. | |
| Biglow Papers (1880) 91: But sech idees soon melted down an’ did n’t leave a grease-spot. | |
| Manchester Spy (NH) 4 Oct. n.p.: ‘He’ll chew thee up so catawampously, that not a grease spot shall be left of thee to load a tooth-pick’s point’. | |
| Dict. of Modern Sl. etc. (2nd edn) 150: grease-spot a minute remnant, humorously the only distinguishable remains of an antagonist after a terrific contest. | |
| , , | | Sl. Dict. |
| in Rainbow in Morning (1965) 86: The town’s not much more than a grease spot in the middle of the road. | |
| Pulp Fiction [film script] 57: If she fuckin’ croaks on me, I’m a grease spot. |
2. (US teen) an unappealing individual who is hard to make go away.
| Brooklyn Dly Eagle (NY) 20 Feb. 11/4: A ‘grease spot’ is a drip that is hard to get rid of. |
(US) a cheap restaurant.
| ‘That Old Gang of Mine’ in Collier’s 20 Jan. 26: [E]ating in roadside grease traps, staving off exhaustion to play our music for ever-increasing crowds. |
In phrases
to work very hard.
| Doctor 368/2: The day was exceedingly hot, and [...] Rubios’s horse was overheated, and, as the phrase was, melted his grease. |