nervous, adj. — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

nervous adj.

(US, orig. jazz) excellent, thrilling; strange.

1926		R. Lardner ‘Hurry Kane’ in Best Stories (1957) 87: If the fans are looking for as ‘nervous’ a finish as last year’s [...] they are doubtless in for a disappointment.
1954		Mad mag. June 20: It was the most; real nervous, real frantic, real cool.
1955		W. White ‘Wayne University Sl.’ AS XXX:4 302: nervous [...] adj. Terms denoting that somebody or something is good.
1957		Wash. Post 29 Sept. F1/1–2: Also added to the teen dictionary is ‘real nervous.’.
2002		‘Touré’ Portable Promised Land (ms.) 157: We Words (My Favorite Things) [...] That’s real. That’s nervous. That’s gangsta. That’s hype.

nervous burger (n.)

(N.Z.) a cigarette.

2003

nervous finger (n.) [? ‘he can’t keep his hands still’]

(US Und.) one given to small-time criminality.

1949

Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).

nervous nellie (n.) (also nervous nelly) [nellie n. (3); orig. used of Frank B. Kellogg, Secretary of State (1925–29)]

1. (US) a fearful, foolish and timid person.

1925		N.Y. Herald Trib. 18 Jan. II. 1/5: [Kellogg] was labeled ‘Nervous Nellie’ by those who were irritated at his maneuvering during the League of Nations fight.
1942		Berrey & Van den Bark Amer. Thes. Sl.
1953		B.C. Marsh Lobbyist for the People 76: We nicknamed him ‘Nervous Nelly.’ In all the States in which I campaigned.
1974		‘P.B. Yuill’ Hazell Plays Solomon (1976) 109: He’s a bit of a nervous nellie.
1989		H. Rawson Dict. of Invective (1991) 252: A nervous Nelly is a person who is easily upset or scared; a nice Nelly is a prude.
1999		D. Lockwood-Lee A Letter to Lawrence 123: I saw the guard approaching, and being a ‘nervous Nelly,’ I grabbed my nearly raw potato, and slunk away and ate it.
2003		M.L. Carter et al. Dark Dreams 25: She was a nervous Nelly who can’t even say her name successfully.
2012		T. Piccirilli Last Kind Words 140: ‘The real nervous nellies will turn green and bow out in the first ten minutes’.

2. attrib. use of sense 1.

1968		A.H. Ryskind Hubert; an Unauthorized Biography 1: Yet his crusade for the American war effort in Viet Nam has not prevented his supporting ‘Nervous Nelly’ Democrats at home.
2002		R.F. Capon Kingdom, Grace, Judgment 65: Second, their nervous-Nelly fear of a truly catholic kingdom leads them to an even deeper reason for distrust.

nervous pudding (n.) [it shakes]

(US) a dish made with gelatine or aspic.

1936

H.W. Bentley ‘Linguistic Concoctions of the Soda Jerker’ in AS XI:1 44: NERVOUS PUDDING. Jello.