Green’s Dictionary of Slang

wanking n.

[wank v. (1)]

1. masturbation.

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[US] in E. Cray Erotic Muse (1992) 317: Frigging in the rigging, / Wanking in the planking, / Masturbating in the grating, / ’Cause there’s fuck all else to do.
[UK]B.S. Johnson All Bull 28: No wanking in your pits!
[UK]P. Larkin ‘Love Again’ in Coll. Poems (1988) 215: Love again: wanking at ten past three.
[UK]F. Pitt-Kethley Sky Ray Lolly 24: The first film was composed of lengthy shots / of ploughing, Yoga, wanking, intercut.
[UK]Guardian G2 29 Sept. 17: A journal read by his mother had published remarks about wanking.
[UK]Observer 29 Aug. 27: And wanking admittedly – but Loaded was always just as much about light relief as hand relief.
Fingers Knott ‘A Little “Five on One”’ [poem] on S(c)htick.net 4 Oct. 🌐 Some will keep it simple / and offer ‘wanking’ or ‘self-help’ / others talk of dolphin waxing, / and laugh until they yelp.
[Aus]T. Spicer Good Girl Stripped Bare 59: A fondness for eating oranges and wanking.

2. in fig. sense, doing something repetitive or mundane.

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[US]N. Stephenson Cryptonomicon 374: Root just feels like talking about words. The SAS blokes refer to this kind of activity as wanking.

In compounds

wanking pit (n.)

a bed, esp. in an institutional context (cf. wank-pit under wank v.).

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D. Holbrook Flesh Wounds 76: You don’t want to just stand there looking shagged, old mate: you want to kip down in that wanking pit and get ready for tomorrow.
J. Nuttall Bomb Culture 265: I remember waking in my National Service wanking pit, with Nasser and Eden flipping their idiot wigs on the radio networks and the strontium 90 thickening.
[UK](con. WWII) B. Aldiss Soldier Erect 108: Wakey-wakey, you lads, out of those wanking-pits at the double!
D. Cook Walter 178: [...] out of that wanking pit, young man. It says here in your notes that you can stand, and even walk.
A. Sillitoe New and Coll. Stories 561: Can’t go to work early if you don’t get to your wanking pit on time.