Green’s Dictionary of Slang

to complain, to grumble (about); thus cribbing n.

1921		(con. 1918) A, Beaman The Squadroon 105: Bill [...] was given neither to optimism nor to cribbing.
1925		(con. WWI) Fraser & Gibbons Soldier and Sailor Words 66: Crib, To: To grumble.
1929		(con. 1916) F. Manning Her Privates We (1986) 190: What are you cribbin’ the officers for? [...] Aren’t you goin’ in for a commission yourself?
1936		K. Mackenzie Living Rough 256: Some of them are always cribbing.
1940		Manchester Eve. News 12 Dec. 2/6: [headline] He Got the Pip [...] / Not satisfied with the choice of unrationed food [...] / Anti-Humbug must crib about ‘Bread and Milk’.
1958		(con. 1940s) B. Behan Borstal Boy 20: That’s the Irish [...] Never done cribbing.
1962		B. McGhee Cut and Run (1963) 101: I wasn’t really cribbing about my sentence. I was quite happy with a ‘carpet’.
1969		P. Boyle All Looks Yellow to the Jaundiced Eye 150: If he was just three-quarter drunk, he’d be in here cribbing and cursing and chawing the fat until he had driven some one of us into a wrangling match.
1980		J. McClure Spike Island (1981) 312: So things altogether haven’t worked out for me [...] but I’m not cribbing.
1991		J.B. Keane Love Bites and Other Stories 11: If some may crib about forcing her into alcoholism I say to these to come and have a gander at the lovely chicks she hatched.
2021		L. McInerney Rules of Revelation 152: ‘If he cribs you just tell him to fuck off’.