slug

The Spanish slug (Arion vulgaris)

Originally referred to a slow, lazy person, from Middle English slugge, probably of Old Norse origin; compare dialectal Norwegian sluggje (“heavy, slow person”).

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• enPR: slŭg, IPA^(key): /slʌɡ/

• Audio (AU)

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• Rhymes: -ʌɡ

slug (plural slugs)

1. Any of many terrestrial pulmonate gastropod mollusks, having no (or only a rudimentary) shell. [from early 18^th c.]
2. (obsolete) A slow, lazy person; a sluggard. [from early 15^th c.]
   • c. 1594, William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Act IV Scene v:

     Why, lamb! Why, lady! Fie, you slug-a-bed.

3. A bullet (projectile). [from 1620s]
   • 1743, Robert Drury, The Pleasant, and Surprizing Adventures of Mr. Robert Drury, during his Fifteen Years Captivity on the Island of Madagascar, London, p. 55,

     […] all our Ammunition was spent. Those of us who had Money made Slugs of it; their next Shift was to take the middle Screws out of their Guns, and charge their Pieces with them.

4. A counterfeit coin, especially one used to steal from vending machines. [from 1880s]
5. A shot of a drink, usually alcoholic. [from 1750s]
6. (journalism) A title, name or header, a catchline, a short phrase or title to indicate the content of a newspaper or magazine story for editing use. [from 1920s]
7. (physics, rarely used) the Imperial (English) unit of mass that accelerates by 1 foot per second squared (1 ft/s²) when a force of one pound-force (lbf) is exerted on it.
8. A discrete mass of a material that moves as a unit, usually through another material.
   • 1973, Pulp & paper international, volume 15:

     When these layers are recovered they inevitably result in a slug of sawdust which goes into the digester and tends to plug the screens in a Kamyr digester.

   • 1987, United States. Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, United States. Board of Mine Operations Appeals, Occupational safety and health decisions:

     Then, just a few nights before August 6, Gilbert testified that a "slug of sand-rock" weighing an estimate of one to two tons fell on his continuous miner as he was taking a cut, approximately fifteen feet from where he was standing.

   • 1998, Orrin H. Pilkey; Katharine L. Dixon, The Corps and the Shore, page 159:

     Tvpically, enough sand is emplaced to create a slug of sand that moves along the shore causing noticeable and somewhat dramatic local changes.

   • 1998, N. A. Krylov; A. A. Bokserman, Evgeniĭ Romanovich Stavrovskiĭ, The oil industry of the former Soviet Union, page 112:

   • 2005, Sam Mannan; Frank P. Lees, Lee's loss prevention in the process industries, page 16-115:

     Another phenomenon investigated was a slug of water falling through the cloud.

   • 2007, William Lauer; Fred Sanchez, Disinfection of pipelines and storage facilities field guide, page 54:

     This method uses a slug of 100 mg/L chlorinated water as a slug that moves along the length of the pipeline. The slug is a percentage of the total length of the pipeline.

   • 2010, Nancy E. McTigue; James M. Symons, American Water Works Association, The water dictionary: a comprehensive reference of water terminology, page 556:

     For example, a slug of iron rust might appear because of the shearing action of a high-demand flow that loosens a previously deposited iron precipitate.

   • 2010, Robert A. Meyers, Extreme Environmental Events, page 1198:

     These experiments investigate the ascent of a slug of gas in a vertical liquid-filed tube featuring a flare that abruptly doubles the cross sectional area.

   • 2011, Bill Calfee, The Art of Rimfire Accuracy, page 125:

     You had to learn to grab the teat up next to the udder with your thumb and side of your first finger, grab a slug of milk and progressively squeeze it down the teat past your middle finger, ring finger and little finger

9. A motile pseudoplasmodium formed by amoebae working together.
10. (television editing) A black screen.
11. (letterpress typography) A piece of type metal imprinted by a linotype machine; also a black mark placed in the margin to indicate an error; also said in application to typewriters; type slug.
12. (regional) A stranger picked up as a passenger to enable legal use of high occupancy vehicle lanes.
13. (US, slang, District of Columbia) A hitchhiking commuter.
14. (web design) The last part of a clean URL, the displayed resource name, similar to a filename.
15. (obsolete) A hindrance, an obstruction.

    (Can we find and add a quotation of Francis Bacon to this entry?)

16. A ship that sails slowly.
    • (Can we date this quote?) Samuel Pepys

      His rendezvous for his fleet, and for all slugs to come to, should be between Calais and Dover.

    (Can we find and add a quotation of Halliwell to this entry?)

17. A hard blow, usually with the fist. [from 1830s]

• (a quantity of a drink): See also Thesaurus:drink

• black slug
• sea slug
• slug line

• lug
• sluggard

• (gastropod): snail

slug (third-person singular simple present slugs, present participle slugging, simple past and past participle slugged)

1. To drink quickly; to gulp; to down.
2. (transitive) To hit very hard, usually with the fist.

   He insulted my mother, so I slugged him.

   The fighter slugged his opponent into unconsciousness.

3. To take part in casual carpooling; to form ad hoc, informal carpools for commuting, essentially a variation of ride-share commuting and hitchhiking.
   • 1998 July 23, “Ramsey Vows to Find New Sites for Commuter `Slug Lines'”, in Washington Post:

     "We believe in car-pooling, but let's do it without restricting traffic. ..." Sam Snyder, 51, of Burke, who has been slugging to his job at the US Customs ....

   • 2002 December 13, Joshua E. Rodd, dc.urban-planning, Usenet, message-ID <FmpK9.110446$%p6.11081387@twister.neo.rr.com>:

     no sane person would attempt to commute that far every day. Sure they do. I've often slugged to Fredericksburg and back. The VRE carries hundreds of people per day, and the I-95 HOV lanes carry tens of thousands of people each day.

4. (intransitive, of a bullet) To become reduced in diameter, or changed in shape, by passing from a larger to a smaller part of the bore of the barrel.
5. (obsolete, intransitive) To move slowly or sluggishly; to lie idle.
   • (Can we date this quote?) Spenser

     To slug in sloth and sensual delight.

6. (transitive) To load with a slug or slugs.

   to slug a gun

7. To make sluggish.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Milton to this entry?)

• slugabed
• slugging match
• slug it out

• Guls, LUGs, lugs

slug (verbal noun sluggey, past participle sluggit)

1. to swallow, swig, slug, guzzle, draw
2. to devour, gorge, gulp
3. to engulf

slug m (genitive singular slug, plural sluggyn)

1. swallow, swig, draught

• sluggag

• Rhymes: -ʉːɡ

slug

1. cunning

• slughet