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Rubberneck
Definitions
- 1 Someone who engages in rubbernecking, or turning and staring.
"We must have looked gorgeous. And what made it worse, there was at least a hundred rubbernecks that didn't have anything better to do than stand around and watch everyone falling all over themselves."
- 2 a person who stares inquisitively wordnet
- 3 A tourist. US, obsolete
- 4 a tourist who is visiting sights of interest wordnet
- 5 Someone or something with a flexible neck.
"A suitable washer B1 and rubberneck B2, both of well known description, are provided to form with clapper arm B3 a watertight joint..."
- 1 To watch by craning the neck (as though it were made of rubber), especially if the observer and observed are in motion relative to each other.
"The driver was so busy rubbernecking, trying to get a good view of the accident, that he was almost part of another accident."
- 2 strain to watch; stare curiously wordnet
- 3 To cause (someone) to watch in fascinated horror, as if rubbernecking to see a roadside accident.
"Hoover’s books go down like a T.M.I. Facebook confessional, rubbernecking you in from the first sentence. Certain patterns quickly emerge."
Etymology
From rubber + neck. Coined in the sense of "tourist" in the United States in the late 19th century. A favored Americanism of H.L. Mencken.
From rubber + neck. Coined in the sense of "tourist" in the United States in the late 19th century. A favored Americanism of H.L. Mencken.
See also for "rubberneck"
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