mickey

Sometimes followed by up: short for mickey-finn (“to drug (someone) with a Mickey Finn (“an alcoholic or non-alcoholic drink deliberately doctored with a drug intended to quickly render the drinker unconscious”); to secretly put a drug into (someone's drink) to render them unconscious”).

Adjective

  1. Short for Mickey Mouse (“excellent, grouse”).

Origin

Alternative letter-case form of Mickey (noun), from Mickey (“diminutive of the male given name Michael”, proper noun), from Mick (“diminutive of the male given name Michael”) + -ey (a variant of -y (diminutive suffix)). Noun sense 1 (“smallest distance that a computer mouse can move a cursor”) refers to the cartoon character Mickey Mouse. Noun sense 5 (“penis”), noun sense 7.1 (“Irishman”), and noun sense 7.2 (“potato; sweet potato”) refer to the fact that since the 17th century Michael and its diminutives Mick, Mickey, and Mike have been one of the most common names in Ireland, and to the prevalence of potatoes in the Irish diet; compare murphy (“potato”). Noun sense 6.2 (“in take the mickey: (false) pride”) possibly refers to the use of Mickey Bliss as rhyming slang for piss (“act of urinating”); compare take the piss and noun sense 6.1. The adjective is short for Mickey Mouse, which...

Forms

more mickey most mickey

Noun

  1. The smallest distance that a computer mouse can move a cursor on a screen, which is used to measure the device's resolution or sensitivity.
    • The Mmove_ratio method controls the ratio of physical mouse movement to screen cursor movement with the x- and y-axis arguments (xsize and ysize) expressed as the number of mickeys (units of mouse motion) required to...
  2. The noisy miner (Manorina melanocephala), a honeyeater endemic to eastern and southeastern Australia.
  3. A young bull, especially one which is unbranded and running wild; a bullock.
    • The cattle slayers had gone their way, with their smoking rifles and the mob of "mickies" they intended, somewhere in the fastnesses of the ranges, to brand and make legally, as far as the letter of the law went, their...
    • Bronco horse pulling a ‘micky’ (young bull) up for branding. - 2005, Jack Drake, The Outback vs the Wild West, Moorooka, Brisbane, Qld.: Boolarong Press, published 2012, →ISBN, page 155:
  4. The vulva.
    • Can't blame her for it, 'cause her mickey was probably throbbin' for it. - 1975, Don [J.] Townshend, chapter 26, in Virginity Stakes, Woollahra, Sydney, N.S.W.: Pan Books in association with Collins, published 1983,...
  5. A small bottle of liquor, such as whiskey, usually holding 375 millilitres (13.2 imperial fluid ounces; 12.7 U.S. fluid ounces), typically shaped to fit in one's pocket.
    • While you’re at the liquor store, get a mickey of rye.
    • "But," said the cook, "if we was in the city I'd take fifty cents of it purty, pronto and get myself a four-bit micky." / "A what?" I asked, mystified. / "A four-bit micky, a fifty-cent bottle of alcohol—Dr. Hall, white...
    • An American pint holds 16 ounces, a Canadian "mickey," 12 ounces of rye, or 13 ounces of Scotch. - 1950, Horace Sutton, “The Facts of Life in Canada”, in Footloose in Canada, New York, N.Y.; Toronto, Ont.: Rinehart &...
  6. The penis.
    • He fell off the bike and injured his mickey.
    • Ill put on my best shift and drawers let him have a good eyeful out of that to make his micky stand for him […] - 1922 February, James Joyce, “[Episode 18: Penelope]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […],...
  7. Short for Mickey Bliss (“an act of urinating; a piss”).
  8. In take the mickey: a person's (false) pride, which is criticized through disparagement or ridicule; piss.
    • 'Higgsy,' said the sergeant, 'they think I'm taking the mickey. Tell 'em.' - 1948, Alexander Baron, “The Doggy Boys”, in From the City, from the Plough, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Ives Washburn, published...
  9. Alternative letter-case form of Mickey (“an Irishman”).
    • There was an old micky named Cassidy / who was famed for impromptu mendacity. / When asked did he lie / he replied: to reply / would be to impugn his veracity. - 1964, Conrad Aiken, “[Number] 5”, in A Seizure of...
  10. A potato or sweet potato; specifically, one roasted over a fire outdoors.
    • We roasted mickeys over a fire with two-foot sticks.
    • dippy runs down the street waving two potatoes. / dippy: Hey, guys, I swiped two maw [more] mickeys. Look! - 1936, Sidney Kingsley, Dead End: A Play in Three Acts, New York, N.Y.: Random House, →OCLC, Act III, page 122:
    • I know where to get some sweet mickeys off the truck. We go roast them in the lot near Belmont. They have sweet mickeys in the South down there? - 1988 August 15, Don DeLillo, Libra, New York, N.Y.: Viking, →ISBN, part...
  11. Alternative letter-case form of Mickey (“a Mickey Finn: an alcoholic drink deliberately doctored with a drug intended to quickly render the drinker unconscious”).
    • He was slipped a mickey.

    Coordinate Terms: roofie

Forms

mickeys

Derived

mickey-take take the mickey Texas mickey throw a mickey

Verb

  1. Sometimes followed by up: short for mickey-finn (“to drug (someone) with a Mickey Finn (“an alcoholic or non-alcoholic drink deliberately doctored with a drug intended to quickly render the drinker unconscious”); to secretly put a drug into (someone's drink) to render them unconscious”).
    • Sam said he hadn't mickeyed me. That meant that he had either prepared a mickey at someone else's order, without knowing for whom it was intended, or he had seen someone else do the concocting. - 1951, Robert O. Saber,...
    • You mickeyed my drink, didn't you? […] You know why I don't drink. You know why I don't do dope. And you mickeyed my drink. You son of a bitch. - 1994, Dana Stabenow, chapter 10, in A Cold Blooded Business, London: Head...
    • No question now, as far as she was concerned, that someone had mickeyed his beer. - 2005 April, Christopher Golden, chapter 5, in Wildwood Road (A Bantam Spectra Book), New York, N.Y.: Bantam Dell, →ISBN, page 65:

Forms

mickeys mickeying mickeyed