Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Slang Having or appearing to have the close relationship of chums.
Wiktionary
- adj. slang Very friendly, especially in an excessive or artificial way.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. (used colloquially) having the relationship of friends or pals
Etymologies
- Reduplication of palsy : pl. of pal + -y1. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Since two of the judges were palsy-walsy with Robert Hanssen, there may be more truth to that than you realise.”
“ "I don't want to get all palsy-walsy with them.”
Fictionaut: For Chronic Reduplicators, Things Aren't Hunky-Dory
“Or do you think it is ok for a presidential candidate to be palsy-walsy with an ex-felon that now happens to have a talk show, and was very, very deeply involved in a secret White House effort to subvert the U.S. Constitution?”
“I can forgive his 9/11 conservatism but I can't forget his palsy-walsy ways with the slugging thug on Fox.”
Michael Conniff: Con Games: Mamet, Miller, And The Ole Hitcheroo Switcheroo
“But the man once dubbed "Obsequio" does still bristle over criticism of his palsy-walsy interviewing style.”
“Teachers, many of whom are young and idealistic and keen to be palsy-walsy with children and play the role of surrogate parent, are paradoxically often the most stalwart champions of the catastrophically counter-productive dogmas regarding classroom arrangement and necessarily knowledge-free lessons in the UK's schools.”
On Thursday, the Legg report will be published along with...
“Michael Kinsley, writing in "The Washington Post" last March said, "CNN's Lou Dobbs, formerly a mild-mannered news anchor, noted for his palsy-walsy interviews with corporate CEOs has turned into a raving popular xenophobe.”
“I spent 30 years fighting the Conservatives at grass-roots level so I am certainly not going to to be 'palsy-walsy' with them.”
“George Bush, the elder, was palsy-walsy with Saudi Arabia, pandering for oil, cutting taxes on the wealthy a la Reagan's fuzzy trickle down economics, championing ousourcing of American jobs, increasing the national debt, borrowing to balance the budget.”
“Let it not be said that Kate and her future stepmother-in-law aren't palsy-walsy.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘palsy-walsy’.
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sionnach's Words
contumely, fomite, holmgang, poltroon, eleemosynary, obsidian, nugatory, grindcore, felch, recrudescent, pyx, parenteral and 3271 more...
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William Steig
Linguistic exuberance from the childrens' books of William Steig
palsy-walsy, squoze, goosewit, oodles, as real as peas a..., clabber cheese, feeling his onions, lard, noggin, bantling, alackaday, flabbergasted and 55 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for palsy-walsy.
yarb He hoped that now, at last, they would get to be palsy-walsy, perhaps even do some chicken chasing together.
- William Steig, The Toy Brother Sep 14, 2008