bughouse

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English

Etymology

From bug +‎ house.

Pronunciation

Noun

bughouse (plural bughouses)

  1. (US, slang) A flea-infested hotel, lodging-house etc.
  2. (US, slang) A prison.
  3. (US, slang) A hospital, especially a lunatic asylum.
  4. (South Africa, slang) A cheap and dirty cinema.

Derived terms

Adjective

bughouse (comparative more bughouse, superlative most bughouse)

  1. (US, slang) Crazy, insane.
    • 1903 February, O. Henry [pseudonym; William Sydney Porter], “Hygeia at the Solito”, in Everybody’s Magazine, volume VIII, number 2, New York, N.Y.: John Wanamaker, →ISSN, page 177, columns 1–2:
      “Get up and dress. I can stand a rattlesnake, but I hate a liar. Do I have to tell you again?” He caught McGuire by the neck and stood him on the floor. / “Say, friend,” cried McGuire wildly, “are you bughouse? I’m sick—see? I’ll croak if I got to hustle. What’ve I done to yer?”—he began his chronic whine—“I never asked yer to⸺”
    • 1934, Agatha Christie, chapter 8, in Murder on the Orient Express, London: HarperCollins, published 2017, page 254:
      'Just what's up on this train? It seems bughouse to me.'
    • 2006, Thomas Pynchon, Against the Day, Vintage, published 2007, page 1127:
      Ewball, man, that is some bughouse talk.
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