Nick vs Gay - What's the difference?
nick | gay |
A small cut in a surface.
# A particular point or place considered as marked by a nick; the exact point or critical moment.
#*, II.20:
#* Howell
# (printing, dated) A notch cut crosswise in the shank of a type, to assist a compositor in placing it properly in the stick, and in distribution.
Meanings connoting something small.
# (cricket) A small deflection of the ball off the edge of the bat, often going to the wicket-keeper for a catch.
# (real tennis) The point where the wall of the court meets the floor.
# (genetics) One of the single-stranded DNA segments produced during nick translation.
(archaic) A nixie, or water-sprite.
* 1879 , Viktor Rydberg, The Magic of the Middle Ages (p.201)
*:imps, giants, trolls, forest-spirits, elves and hobgoblins in and on the earth; nicks , river-sprites in the water, fiends in the air, and salamanders in the fire.
(UK, slang) In the expressions in bad nick'' and ''in good nick : condition.
* '>citation
(British, slang) A police station or prison.
To make a nick or notch in; to cut or scratch in a minor way.
# To make a cross cut or cuts on the underside of (the tail of a horse, in order to make the animal carry it higher).
# To mar; to deface; to make ragged, as by cutting nicks or notches in.
#* Prior
#* Shakespeare
To suit or fit into, as by a correspondence of nicks; to tally with.
* Camden
# To hit at, or in, the nick; to touch rightly; to strike at the precise point or time.
#* L'Estrange
# To throw or turn up (a number when playing dice); to hit upon.
#* {{quote-book, year=1773
, author=Oliver Goldsmith
, title=She Stoops to Conquer
, text=My old luck: I never nicked seven that I did not throw ames ace three times following.}}
# (cricket) to hit the ball with the edge of the bat and produce a fine deflection
(obsolete) To nickname; to style.
* Ford
(slang) To steal.
(transitive, British, slang) To arrest.
, originally a nickname for a cheerful or lively person.
from the word gay, "joyful"; rare today.
. Also a shortened form of Gabriel, Gaylord and similar names, or transferred from the surname.
* 1992 , Unto the Sons , Ballantine Books 1993, ISBN 0804110336, page 15
* 2004 , Bad Dirt , Fourth Estate, ISBN 0007196911, page 32
In obsolete terms the difference between nick and gay
is that nick is to nickname; to style while gay is an ornament.As nouns the difference between nick and gay
is that nick is a small cut in a surface while gay is a homosexual, especially a male homosexual; see also lesbian.As verbs the difference between nick and gay
is that nick is to make a nick or notch in; to cut or scratch in a minor way while gay is to make happy or cheerful.As proper nouns the difference between nick and gay
is that nick is a diminutive of the male given name Nicholas while Gay is {{surname|A=An|English|from=nicknames}}, originally a nickname for a cheerful or lively person.As an adjective gay is
happy, joyful, and lively.nick
English
(wikipedia nick)Noun
(en noun)- in the nick of time
- Truely he flies when he is even upon the nicke , and naturally hasteneth to escape it, as from a step whereon he cannot stay or containe himselfe, and feareth to sinke into it.
- to cut it off in the very nick
- a user's reserved nick on an IRC network
- The car I bought was cheap and in good nick .
- He was arrested and taken down to Sun Hill nick [police station] to be charged.
- He's just been released from Shadwell nick [prison] after doing ten years for attempted murder.
Derived terms
* in the nick of timeVerb
(en verb)- I nicked myself while I was shaving.
- And thence proceed to nicking sashes.
- The itch of his affection should not then / Have nicked his captainship.
- Words nicking and resembling one another are applicable to different significations.
- The just season of doing things must be nicked , and all accidents improved.
- For Warbeck, as you nick him, came to me.
- Someone's nicked my bike!
- The police nicked him climbing over the fence of the house he'd broken into.
gay
English
Proper noun
(en proper noun)- - - - my father's father, Gaetano Talese ( whose name I inherited after my birth in 1932, in the anglicized from of "Gay "), was an atypically fearless traveler,
- "Mr Gay Brawls. What a name."
- "It didn't use to mean what it means now. Plenty were named Gay'. Even in Nevada. Was old ' Gay Pitch had a gas station in Winnemucca. Nobody thought nothin about it and he raised a railroad car of kids.- - -