Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. in fig. use, implying short.

1550		Udall Ralph Roister Doister IV viii: Truce, hold your hands! truce, for a pissing while or twain.
1575		Gammer Gurton’s needle n.p.: [H]e shal neuer be at rest, one pissing while a day / But he must trudge about the towne.
c.1591		Shakespeare Two Gentlemen of Verona IV iv: He had not been there [...] a pissing-while; but all the chamber smelt him.
1607		E. Sharpham The fleire n.p.: Fle: Hee’s a mad fellowe wil loue anie of you all, longer then a pissing while.
1620		Cervantes [trans.] Don Quixote pt 2 113: [Y]our Knight Errant must not bee looking euery pissing-while who shall heale him.
1632		Jonson Magnetic Lady I vii: I shall entreat your Mistress Madam Expectation [...] to have patience but a pissing while.
1668		T. Shadwell The sullen lovers 66: Cou. Gent. I had not the power as I was a saying, to keep from you longer, Lady, not so much as a pissing while.
1679		The Country club 10: But mark conclusions, you shall hardly sit ye / A pissing while, or singing out a Ditty; / Till they adjourn’d into a grand Committee.
1680		The last speech and dying-words of Thomas Pride 7: [T]he life of man is but a pissing-while.
1857		T. Wright Dict. Obsolete and Provincial English 746/1: Pissing-while a. A very common phrase among the writers of the Elizabethan period for a short time.
1962		(con. WWII) J.O. Killens And Then We Heard The Thunder (1964) 215: You have the goddamn nerve to build a canteen in pissing distance from our tents.

2. urinating.

1613		Dekker A Strange Horse-Race in Grosart Works (1885) 338: Hobling, which put him in such a heate (He neuer in his life sweating before) that he melted all his tallow, which at most was not able to make a pissing candle.
1618		G. Mynshul Essayes of Prison n.p.: Their tongues run faster then the clock one shrove-tuesday, the pissing Conduit in cheapside.
c.1620		Fletcher Women Pleased I ii: You gave it me in water [...] it was so hearty I shall turne pissing Conduit shortly.
1663		Head Hic et Ubique V i: There’s ne’re an Inne-door, nor Pissing-place, but is chequer’d with ’em.
1700		N. Ward The Rambling Rakes 4: Their Walls Adorn’d with Piss-tubs [...] And ’tis a strong Argument, that too many have more Respect for a Pissing-Corner.
1707		N. Ward Wooden World 81: A Man without Noise, is a Thing without a Soul, and fit for nothing but a Pissing-Post.
1724		ref. in H. Rawson Dict. of Invective (1991) 9: When Lady Mary Wortley Montagu wished to describe the uninhibited behaviour of the wife of the French ambassador upon receiving visitors in 1724, the word she used was pissing.

3. of rain, pouring down, extreme.

1928		S. O’Casey Silver Tassie II 44: In the falling, pissing rine and whistling wind.
2000		Indep. Rev. 28 Feb. 1: Where were you in the pissing rain against Bristol City on a Tuesday night?
2000		R.G. Barrett Leaving Bondi (2013) [ebook] I’m driving somewhere in the pissing rain.

4. a general adj. of abuse; a euph. for fucking adj. (1)

1947		N. Wilborn ‘Mother Fuyer’ 🎵 He’s a loafin mother fuyer, don’t you know / Pissin’ mother fuyer, / I ain’t gonna tell you no lie.
1951		K. Amis letter 22 Dec. in Leader (2000) 267: Here I am and here I bloody fucking bastard buggering sodding pissing shitting stay.
1966		T. Keyes All Night Stand 23: ‘Bad for the career.’ ‘What pissing career?’.
1978		(con. 1940s) J.G. Farrell Singapore Grip 152: I heard that, y’ pissin’ old goat.
1986		A. Bleasdale No Surrender 22: On a pissin’ pensioners’ outing.