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  1. mooch love

Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. v. To obtain or try to obtain by begging; cadge. See Synonyms at cadge.
  2. v. To steal; filch.
  3. v. To get or try to get something free of charge; sponge: lived by mooching off friends.
  4. v. To wander about aimlessly.
  5. v. To skulk around; sneak.
  6. n. One who begs or cadges; a sponge.
  7. n. A dupe, as in a confidence game.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. See mouch.

Wiktionary

  1. v. UK To wander around aimlessly, often causing irritation to others.
  2. v. To beg, cadge, or sponge; to exploit or take advantage of others for personal gain.
  3. v. UK To steal or filch.
  4. n. One who mooches; a moocher.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. v. to ask for and get free; to borrow without intending to repay; to sponge; -- usually with objects of small value.
  2. v. To beg for.

WordNet 3.0

  1. v. ask for and get free; be a parasite
  2. n. someone who mooches or cadges (tries to get something free)

Etymologies

  1. From Middle English moochen, mouchen, michen ("to pretend poverty"), from Old French muchier, mucier, mucer ("to skulk, hide, conceal"), from Old Frankish *mukjan ("to hide, conceal oneself"), from Proto-Germanic *mukjanan, *mukōnan (“to hide, ambush”), from Proto-Indo-European *meug-, *meuk- (“to slip, slide”). Cognate with Old High German mūhhōn ("to store, cache, plunder"), Middle High German muchen, mucken ("to hide, stash"). (Wiktionary)
  2. Middle English mowchen, probably from Old French muchier, to hide, skulk. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

Examples

  • “I know I should go to my family or charity for help before I mooch from the taxpayer, but I am good liberal and I just can’t help myself.”

    Think Progress » Democrats Need To Pass A Comprehensive Health Care Bill

  • “Morningstar analyst Peter Wahlstrom said consumers who so-call "mooch" will likely adapt.”

    KansasCity.com: Front Page

  • “A mooch is a mooch, no matter what the nationality or ethnicity.”

    Latest Articles

  • “Don, what does "mooch" mean when the wines are to be poured to other wine bloggers as an introduction to New York Wines?”

    Wine Bloggers Conference 2008: The New York Wines

  • “Actually I'm borrowing it from the library" - Cynthia D. "See you forgot the 'mooch' choice which is for all us folks who plan to obtain the book from the hordes who pre-ordered it.”

    July 2007

  • “I dont ever want to have the "mooch" label, I used to know this guy a friend of the families, that was one he used to piss us off, he would come camping and i swear all he brought was a tent, and cloths, no food, no blankets, no nothing.”

    vishant Diary Entry

  • “Barty Mangan's opportunities for meeting Christian had been but few, but they had sufficed to light a fatal star in his sky, and to induce in him, when, as now, he found himself in her vicinity, an attitude towards the rest of the world that justified his mother's employment of the verb to "mooch" (a word that may be taken as implying a moody and furtive aloofness).”

    Mount Music

  • “But the next minute, hearing the polisher say with a sneer to Corentine that 'mooch' e cared for the 'ception-room of the great Villemain,' Léonard Astier shrugged his shoulders, and at the thought of such ignorance his half-felt envy gave way to a deep and benign compassion.”

    The Immortal Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877

  • “Let me begin by defining what a "mooch" is: A mooch shows up at your apartment and eats your food.”

    Kansan.com stories

  • “BookMooch works on a points system: each book you give away earns you a point; you can use those points to "mooch" a book from someone else.”

    Macworld

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synonyms (4)

Words with the same meaning

  1. bum
  1. cadge
  1. grub
  1. sponge

same context (24)

Words that are found in similar contexts

  1. hard
  2. chanapa
  3. alse
  4. eez
  1. artykuysuperego
  2. Kati
  3. protein-rich
  4. Fon
  1. geo
  2. nevair
  3. apere
  4. to'
  1. taxpayers'
  2. thayre
  3. ordinal
  4. Bree
  1. alzo
  2. damn
  3. nete
  4. snyad
  1. Barney
  2. dead-looking
  3. 21
  4. owr

reverse dictionary (1)

Words that contain this word in their definition

  1. mouch

tags (1)

Free-form, user-generated categorization

  1. monosyllable

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Lists

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  • yarb Ha ha! Jun 4, 2009

  • qroqqa A mooch-cow is one that just stands in a field chewing grass and looking at you. Jun 4, 2009

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‘mooch’ has been looked up 2133 times, loved by 3 people, added to 28 lists, commented on 2 times, and has a Scrabble score of 12.