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bum

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bum

1  [buhm] noun, verb, bummed, bum⋅ming, adjective, bum⋅mer, bum⋅mest.
Use bum in a Sentence
–noun
1. a person who avoids work and sponges on others; loafer; idler.
2. a tramp, hobo, or derelict.
3. Informal. an enthusiast of a specific sport or recreational activity, esp. one who gives it priority over work, family life, etc.: a ski bum; a tennis bum.
4. Informal. an incompetent person.
5. a drunken orgy; debauch.
–verb (used with object)
6. Informal. to borrow without expectation of returning; get for nothing; cadge: He's always bumming cigarettes from me.
7. Slang. to ruin or spoil: The weather bummed our whole weekend.
–verb (used without object)
8. to sponge on others for a living; lead an idle or dissolute life.
9. to live as a hobo.
–adjective Slang.
10. of poor, wretched, or miserable quality; worthless.
11. disappointing; unpleasant.
12. erroneous or ill-advised; misleading: That tip on the stock market was a bum steer.
13. lame: a bum leg.
—Verb phrase
14. bum around, Informal. to travel, wander, or spend one's time aimlessly: We bummed around for a couple of hours after work.
—Idioms
15. bum (someone) out, Slang. to disappoint, upset, or annoy: It really bummed me out that she could have helped and didn't.
16. on the bum, Informal.
a. living or traveling as or in a manner suggesting that of a hobo or tramp.
b. in a state of disrepair or disorder: The oven is on the bum again.
Origin:
1860–65, Americanism; perh. shortening of or back formation from bummer 1 ; adj. senses of unclear relation to sense “loafer” and perh. of distinct orig.

Synonyms:
2. vagabond, vagrant.
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bum

2  [buhm]
–noun Chiefly British Slang.
the buttocks; rump.
Origin:
1350–1400; ME bom; of uncert. orig.

bum

3  [buhm]
–noun Military Slang.
1. a reproduction of a document made with copying equipment.
2. a bag into which classified waste is put in preparation for destruction.
Origin:
perh. as shortening of bumf or bumfodder; def. 2 presumably as shortening of bum bag
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
Cite This Source Link To bum
bum 1   (bŭm)   
n.  

  1. A tramp; a vagrant.

  2. A lazy or shiftless person, especially one who seeks to live solely by the support of others.

  3. An incompetent, insignificant, or obnoxious person: The batter called the pitcher a bum.

  4. One who is devoted to a particular activity or milieu: a beach bum.

v.   bummed, bum·ming, bums

v.   intr.

  1. To live by begging and scavenging from place to place. Often used with around.

  2. To loaf.

v.   tr.

  1. To acquire by begging; cadge. See Synonyms at cadge.

  2. Slang To depress, dishearten, or dismay. Often used with out.

adj.  

  1. Inferior; worthless: gave me bum advice; did a bum job of fixing the car.

  2. Disabled; malfunctioning: a bum shoulder.

  3. Unfavorable or unfair: got a bum deal on my final grade for the course.

  4. Unpleasant; lousy: had a bum time at the party.


[Back-formation from bummer.]
bum 2   (bŭm)   
n.   Chiefly British Slang
The buttocks.

[Middle English bom.]
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Slang Dictionary
bum

  1. n.
    a vagrant; a good-for-nothing. : You had better get your finances in order unless you want to become a bum.
  2. mod.
    bad; faulty. : This is a bum fuse. No wonder it won't run.

  3. Go to bum (sth) (off). :
Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
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bum (sth) (off (so))

  1. tv.
    to beg or borrow something (from someone). : Can I bum two quarters for a phone call?
Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
Cite This Source
Word Origin & History

bum  (1)
"buttocks," 1387, "probably onomatopoeic, to be compared with other words of similar sound and with the general sense of 'protuberance, swelling.' " [OED]

bum  (2)
"dissolute loafer, tramp," 1864, Amer.Eng., from bummer "loafer, idle person" (1855), possibly an extension of the British word for "backside" (similar development took place in Scotland, 1540), but more prob. from Ger. slang bummler "loafer," from bummeln "go slowly, waste time." Bum first appears in a Ger.-Amer. context, and bummer was popular in the slang of the North's army in Amer. Civil War (as many as 216,000 Ger. immigrants in the ranks). Bum's rush "forcible ejection" first recorded 1910. Bummer "bad experience" is 1960s slang.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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Computing Dictionary

bum
1. To make highly efficient, either in time or space, often at the expense of clarity. "I managed to bum three more instructions out of that code." "I spent half the night bumming the interrupt code." In elder days, John McCarthy (inventor of Lisp) used to compare some efficiency-obsessed hackers among his students to "ski bums"; thus, optimisation became "program bumming", and eventually just "bumming".
2. To squeeze out excess; to remove something in order to improve whatever it was removed from (without changing function; this distinguishes the process from a featurectomy).
3. A small change to an algorithm, program, or hardware device to make it more efficient. "This hardware bum makes the jump instruction faster."
Usage: now uncommon, largely superseded by v. tune (and tweak, hack), though none of these exactly capture sense 2. All these uses are rare in Commonwealth hackish, because in the parent dialects of English "bum" is a rude synonym for "buttocks".
[The Jargon File]

The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing, © 1993-2007 Denis Howe
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Idioms & Phrases

bum

In addition to the idioms beginning with bum, also see on the blink (bum).

The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer.
Copyright © 1997. Published by Houghton Mifflin.
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