handbags at dawn
(New Zealand, informal) Competitors on a sporting field (often in a rugby game) getting into a fight; appearing threatening but not really causing any damage.
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Born ~1980 · no dated citations yetDefinitions
(New Zealand, informal) Competitors on a sporting field (often in a rugby game) getting into a fight; appearing threatening but not really causing any damage.
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(British, humorous, idiomatic) A catty squabble.
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🇬🇧About British & Irish slang slang
UK and Irish slang — Cockney, Scouse, Geordie, Yorkshire, Glaswegian, Brummie, Welsh, West Country, plus Irish English. Centuries of regional dialects feeding into modern British and Irish street talk.
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Semantically related
- handbags74%
(UK, slang) An insignificant fight or argument.
- handbags69%
(British, slang) Said jocularly in response to a particularly derogatory, bitchy or catty dialogue; calm down; cool it.
- handbag69%
(British, transitive, idiomatic, humorous, metonym) To attack verbally or subject to criticism (typically used of a woman).
- handbagging68%
(UK, humorous) A verbal attack or criticism.