stir-crazy

See also: stir crazy

English

Alternative forms

• stir crazy

Etymology

First attested around 1925, from prison slang stir (“jail or prison”).

Pronunciation

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

Adjective

stir-crazy (comparative more stir-crazy, superlative most stir-crazy)

1. (slang) Of a prisoner, mentally unbalanced due to prolonged incarceration.
2. (slang, by extension) Restless, uncomfortable, or impatient due to inactivity or confinement.

   After so many days of rain, the kids started to get a bit stir-crazy.

   • 2020 March 19, Megan Garber, “The Utter Weirdness of Small Talk in a Pandemic”, in The Atlantic‎^[1]:

     And many, at the same time, are anxious and bored and underemployed and overemployed and stir-crazy and uncertain and lonely and terrified.

See also

• cabin fever