flat chat
English
[edit]Alternative forms
[edit]Etymology
[edit](This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)
Pronunciation
[edit]Audio (General Australian): (file) Audio (General Australian): (file)
Adverb
[edit]flat chat (not comparable)
- (Australia, idiomatic) At maximum capability, intensity, or speed.
- We had the car going flat chat down the highway when the cops pulled us over.
- 1987, Tim Winton, That Eye, The Sky, page 110:
- If there was a radio we'd have it going flat-chat, boy.
- 1998, John Marsden, The Night is for Hunting, unnumbered page:
- I spun around yet again and took off flat chat.
- 2012, Chris Hammer, The River: A Journey Through the Murray-Darling Basin[1], page 166:
- I′m driving flat chat as I cross Green Gully, a nondescript depression in the wide flat plain of western New South Wales.
Adjective
[edit]flat chat (not comparable)
- (Australia, idiomatic) Extremely busy.
- Can you call me back tomorrow, mate? I′m flat chat at the moment.
- 1997, Alexis Wright, Plains of Promise[2], page 228:
- “Look,” he went on, “I don′t even remember writing anything in the bloody diary, for Christ′s sake. I was flat chat at the time.”
- 2007, Joanna Hunt, Jacqui′s Dilemma[3], page 64:
- “Sorry, I′m flat chat with work. I don′t see how you can get away until Saturday.”
- 2009, Sean Dooley, Cooking With Baz, Large Print 16pt Edition, page 167,
- Except that I was too flat chat to get up and collect it myself so I motioned to Wok as surreptitiously as I could, nodding in the direction of the note lying invitingly on the asphalt. Wok stared back at me uncomprehendingly.
Usage notes
[edit]"Flat strap" is commonly misused in place of "flat chat", however the origin of the word - shortened from "flat out chatting" - points to "flat chat" being the correct implementation.