bender

One who, or that which, bends.

Interjection

  1. Used to express disbelief or doubt at what one has just heard.
  2. Used to indicate that the previous phrase was meant sarcastically or ironically.
    • O yes, I'll do it — bender!

Origin

Hypotheses: * bend + -er. In sense of “heavy drinking”, originally generally “spree”, from 1846, of uncertain origin – vague contemporary sense of “something extraordinary”, connection to bend (e.g., bending elbow to drink (bend one's elbow)) or perhaps from Scottish sense of “strong drinker”. * In Britain, for about four centuries, a sixpence was known as a bender because its silver content made it easy to bend in the hands. This was commonly done to create ‘love tokens’, many of which survive in collections to this day. The value of a sixpence was also enough to get thoroughly inebriated as taverns would often allow you to drink all day for two pence. This gave rise to the expression ‘going on a bender’. * (interjection): From over the bender, referring to a person's arm (and sometimes accompanied by a gesture of the thumb backward over the shoulder); compare over the left shoulder.

Synonyms

bullshit I don't think not over the bender over the left over the left shoulder

Noun

  1. One who, or that which, bends.
  2. A device to aid bending of pipes to a specific angle.
  3. A bout of heavy drinking or drug use.
    • He's been out on a bender with his mates.
    • A couple of students of Williams College went over to North Adams on a bender. This would have been serious matter under the best of circumstances, but each returned with a “brick in his hat,” etc. - 1857, Newspaper,...
    • "Wait, is this about the other night when you two lightweights totally went on that bender?" - 2005 August 23, Haley Hazelton, Misfile (webcomic), 2005-08-23:

    Synonyms: batter binge

  4. A homosexual man.
    • “So they're easy about having a bender in the house, are they, their lordships?” - 2004, Alan Hollinghurst, chapter 6, in The Line of Beauty […], London: Picador, →ISBN:
  5. A simple shelter, made using flexible branches or withies.
  6. A suspended sentence.
    • 'Oh and Gary, what happened in Ahmed?' 'Not guilty, sir.' 'Oh no! And Tredwell?' 'Bender.' 'Suspended sentence? So both walked. […] - 2015, Olly Jarvis, Death by Dangerous, page 81:
    • He anticipated a prison sentence though he thought there was a slight possibility of 'getting off on a bender' (suspended sentence). - 2019, Howard Williamson, Youth and Policy: Contexts and Consequences:
  7. A sixpence.
    • What will you take to be paid out?’ said the butcher. ‘The regular chummage is two–and–six. Will you take three bob?’ ‘And a bender,’ suggested the clerical gentleman. ‘Well, I don’t mind that; it’s only twopence a...
  8. A spree, a frolic.
  9. Something exceptional.

Forms

benders

Synonyms

binge spree toot male homosexual bender tent

Derived

bagel bender banana-bender banana bender B-bender bumder conduit bender fender-bender fender bender gender bender gender-bender genre-bender hellbender mindbender over the bender pipe bender pretzel-bender reality bender spaghetti bender spoonbender taco bender taco-bender tickly-bender wirebender