blowable

English

Etymology

From blow +‎ -able.

Adjective

blowable (comparative more blowable, superlative most blowable)

1. Capable of being blown or blown away; that can be subjected to blowing.

   The molten glass has to be the correct viscosity to be blowable.

   The gale force wind blew every blowable object to the north, including things I didn't even know were blowable, like the roof.

   • 1938, Society of glass technology, Journal of the Society of Glass Technology - Volume 22, page 207:

     Moreover, if resins should be eventually produced in a form in which they are "blowable," may we not find then that their properties are almost exactly like those of glass —and particularly in regard to brittleness?

   • 1951, Margaret Elizabeth Mulac, Marian Susan Holmes, The Party Game Book, page 128:

     Give them time to get the gum chewed and blowable .

   • 1996 November, “Doggone it, it's a new ceramic binder”, in DOE this Month, page 14:

     Engineers are considering using the blowable insulation to rehabilitate residential buildings in Chicago under an Argonne partnership with Bethel New Life, a Chicago community economic initiative.

   • 1997, Paul G. Marinos, Engineering Geology and the Environment - Volume 1, page 579:

     Initial flooding will be accomplished via linear irrigation configurations to provide maximum coverage of the blowable surface.

   • 2013, Andrew Goudie, Encyclopedia of Geomorphology, page 905:

     Some small dunefields are almost wholly active, in the sense that all the dunes are in movement, and most of the surface bare and blowable.

   • 2013, Ruth Groff, John Greco, Powers and Capacities in Philosophy, page 98:

     The change-process story is this: in the relevant arrangement, the wind exercises its power to push a blowable thing, and a blowable thing exercises its power to catch the wind and move.

   • 2022, Alan Walden, Networking: A Lifelong Adventure:

     The city, they told the audience, resembled an enormous slum as the piles of refuse grew ever higher and strong winter winds blew whatever was blowable through the streets of Gotham City.

2. That is operated by blowing
   • 2015, Margherita Antona, Constantine Stephanidis, Universal Access in Human-Computer Interaction, page 280:

     BLUI: Low-cost Localized Blowable User Interfaces
     BLUI [4] presents a form of hands-free interaction that can be implemented on laptop/desktop computing platforms. This approach supports blowing at a laptop or computer screen to directly control certain interactive applications.

   1. That makes a noise when blown.
      • 1981, The Saturday Evening Post Christmas for Children Book, page 68:

        Golly , I've never met a deer with a removable, blowable horn before!

      • 2002, Perry R. Cook, Real Sound Synthesis for Interactive Applications, page 127:

        As a final wind modeling exercise, we'll build an efficient and blowable model of a bottle.

      • 2003, Raven Kaldera, Tannin Schwartzstein, Handfasting and Wedding Rituals: Welcoming Hera's Blessing:

        If possible, a ram's horn that is blowable, like a shofar.

      • 2011, Franklin M. Garrett, Atlanta and Environs:

        Among them were a Bible, eaten up with age, but recognizable by its clasp and gilt edges and a few words; a medical newspaper; a bottle of alcohol; a piece of white silk ribbon; and old Roman cane, and a pea whistle made of horn. The latter was still blowable, and spoke after half a century's silence.

3. That can be achieved or produced by blowing.
   • 1962, Court of Customs and Patent Appeals Reports - Volume 50, page 888:

     Appellant additionally contends that Wadman selectively cools a predetermined shape which is already a blowable bubble, but does not show selective chilling during extrusion, nor does he show forming a blowable bubble after extrusion and selective cooling.

   • 1993, Proceedings from ESMO - Volume 6, page 262:

     In the following table, two sets of parameters were chosen to see how the variables influence blowable distance.

   • 2017, SamuelL. Belcher, Practical Extrusion Blow Molding:

     In conventional blow molding, a parison is first formed by extruding a heat-softened thermoplastic tube and pinching off the bottom or, alternatively, by injection molding of the blowable geometric form directly.

4. (of an egg) That can be emptied by blowing; that does not contain any large solid developing bird.
   • 1904, C.F. Belcher, “Some Notes on the Rufous Bristle Bird”, in Geelong Naturalist, page 157:

     However, the egg proved blowable .

   • 1907, John Wolley, Alfred Newton, Ootheca Wolleyana, page 260:

     I blew the eggs: three of them were very blowable, the fourth had a large young one inside .

   • 1912, Edward William Nelson, Descriptions of Two New Species of Nun Birds from Panama, page 8:

     At the time of our visit on July 4, most of the young had hatched and were running about, some nests still contained young or pipped eggs and several held sets of two or three blowable eggs.

   • 2017, H. T. Gosnell, The Science of Birdnesting:

     If the egg when taken from the nest and held to the sun, shows any transparency, then it is blowable.

5. That can blow, or expel air.
   • 1856 March, Blanche, “Annals of Snailtown”, in Waverley Magazine, volume 12, number 9, page 143:

     But he must have some practical principle to be guided by; for going upon the assumptions that all noses are blowable, Mr. Silver must of course blow his.

   • 1869 August, “What Were HIs Intentions?”, in Frank Leslie's Pleasant Hours, volume 7, number 1, page 136:

     In fact, Miss Jenkins, matrimony has not been the subject of my thoughts lately, though I could not have found a lovelier person with whom to have the honor of being united (with a bow); but to get a plaster cast of a fine-shaped female nose, for my patent self-clasping, sneezable, blowable nose.

   • 1964, E. W. Seabrook Hull, The Bountiful Sea, page 62:

     It was a preposterous looking small, roughly made, wooden craft powered by a gasoline motor exhausting through a hose to a float on the surface, but it sported blowable ballast tanks– the first submarine to do so.

   • 1995, Roy Burcher, Louis J. Rydill, Concepts in Submarine Design:

     If stowed in MBTs, solid ballast will reduce the blowable volume and so affect the reserve of buoyancy.

   • 2008, Alice Pung, Growing Up Asian in Australia, page 60:

     My parents would probably have had me blowing the hen's noses if they'd thought of it...and if hens had blowable noses .

6. That can be blown up or blown off; subject to explosive forces.
   • 2000, Irwin Shaw, The Young Lions, page 340:

     Blowing the bridge wouldn't delay anyone more than a minute or two, but the Pioneers doggedly blew everything blowable, as though they were carrying out some ancient religious ritual.

   • 2008, B-36 Peacemaker Pilot's Flight Operating Instructions, page 248:

     When the aircraft is pressurized and the pressure altitude is above 25,000 feet, crew members stationed near blowable structures, such as blisters or large plexiglas panels, will keep their seat belts or safety straps fastened, if provided.

   • 2010, Agne Rustan, Claude Cunningham, William Fourney, Mining and Rock Construction Technology Desk Reference:

     dry blasting agent: an explosive that is blowable at charging but not pumpable.

   • 2022, John Oxenham, A Maid of the Silver Sea:

     […] in excellent order, and calculated to blow into smithereens anything blowable that stood up before it within the short limit of its range.

7. (electronics) That can cease to function when overloaded.
   • 1993, Stuart Asser, Vincent Stigliano, Richard Bahrenburg, Microcomputer Theory and Servicing, page 233:

     The blowable fuses are used to connect the product and sum lines to the output.

   • 2002, Purakh Raj Verma, Zia Alan Shafi, Yu Shan, Zeng Zheng, Manju Sarkar, Shao-Fu Sanford Chu, “Method for Forming a Thin-Film, Electrically Blowable Fuse with a Reproducible Blowing Wattage”, in Official Gazette of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, page 3080:

     A method for forming a thin film, blowable fuse, comprising the steps of: […]

   • 2017, Farhana Sheikh, Leonel Sousa, Circuits and Systems for Security and Privacy, page 211:

     The evolution of fuse technology has resulted in the electrically blowable fuse approach (eFUSE).

8. Secret and vulnerable to being revealed.
   • 1997, Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons, Parliamentary Debates (Hansard).:, page 1127:

     The new clause provides a greater incentive for well-paid employees—those arguably more likely to have access to potentially "blowable" information .

9. (of skin) Delicate, smooth, and flawless.
   • 2019, Chen Ling, The Story of Illegitimate Daughter:

     He had an exquisite oval face. Blowable skin.

   • 2019, Wu Ji, Coffin-Carrying Man:

     When she got so close to me, so close, I realized that the policewoman's skin was indeed the same as my first impression. It could almost be described as "blowable".

   • 2020, Yang Cong, Peerless Immortal Sovereign in City:

     The even skin, baby-like skin, could actually be described as blowable, and the muscles that bulged out of his heart were strong enough to reflect a man's charm.

   • 2020, Zhenyinfang, When I Was a Loan Shark:

     I think this shouls be a nice girl who listens to her mother's words, and her work and rest are very healthy, as can be seen from her flapping, blowable skin. When I saw her just now, I wanted to poke at her face very much because her face was as soft and tender as a child's.

10. That one could give a blowjob to.
    • 2014, Leith Lachlan Wulf, The Scandalous Ecstasies of the Statuesque Sensationalists, page 311:

      Then you can blow every blowable object in the honeymoon suite, if you so fancy such kink.

    • 2019, Jasmine Haynes, Jennifer Skully, Power to the Max:

      "There's the doable guys." She glanced at Max. "You know, the ones you wouldn't kick out of bed for eating crackers.” Just like Sutter would have said. Max was thinking that very thing the other night in regards to the Greek God. Angela winked. “Then there's the blowable ones.”

Derived terms

• blowability
• unblowable