"clean someone's clock" meaning in English

See clean someone's clock in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

Audio: en-au-clean someone's clock.ogg [Australia] Forms: cleans someone's clock [present, singular, third-person], cleaning someone's clock [participle, present], cleaned someone's clock [participle, past], cleaned someone's clock [past]
Etymology: Originally military slang; perhaps from clock face. Etymology templates: {{m|en|clock face}} clock face Head templates: {{en-verb|*}} clean someone's clock (third-person singular simple present cleans someone's clock, present participle cleaning someone's clock, simple past and past participle cleaned someone's clock)
  1. (idiomatic, informal) To defeat someone decisively, in a physical fight or other competition or negotiation. Tags: idiomatic, informal Categories (topical): Violence Synonyms: fix someone's clock, mop the floor with somebody, trounce Derived forms: get one's clock cleaned Translations (defeat decisively): met iemand de vloer aanvegen (Dutch), iemand uitschakelen (Dutch), battre à plate couture (French), разде́лать под оре́х (razdélatʹ pod oréx) (Russian), разма́зать по сте́нке (razmázatʹ po sténke) (Russian)

Inflected forms

Download JSON data for clean someone's clock meaning in English (3.9kB)

{
  "etymology_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "clock face"
      },
      "expansion": "clock face",
      "name": "m"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "Originally military slang; perhaps from clock face.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "cleans someone's clock",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "cleaning someone's clock",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "cleaned someone's clock",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "cleaned someone's clock",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "*"
      },
      "expansion": "clean someone's clock (third-person singular simple present cleans someone's clock, present participle cleaning someone's clock, simple past and past participle cleaned someone's clock)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
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          "source": "w"
        },
        {
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          "parents": [
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            "Entry maintenance"
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          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
          "parents": [
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            "Entry maintenance"
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          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "topical",
          "langcode": "en",
          "name": "Violence",
          "orig": "en:Violence",
          "parents": [
            "Human behaviour",
            "Human",
            "All topics",
            "Fundamental"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "derived": [
        {
          "word": "get one's clock cleaned"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1997 November 12, Richard W. Stevenson, “Executives Say Trade Bill Defeat Will Hurt Economy”, in New York Times, retrieved 2008-10-07",
          "text": "\"When big business goes head to head with unions, the unions clean their clock,\" said one Republican aide in Congress.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2007 April 28, Carla Marinucci, “Hillary on a roll”, in San Francisco Chronicle, retrieved 2008-10-07",
          "text": "Barack Obama cleaned her clock in the debates.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2008 September 27, Jake Donovan, “Vicente Escobedo Rallies, Stops Dominic Salcido In Six”, in BoxingScene.com, retrieved 2008-10-07",
          "text": "The heavily-tattooed Perez never recovered, getting nailed with flush head shots before a clean-up left hook cleaned his clock.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To defeat someone decisively, in a physical fight or other competition or negotiation."
      ],
      "id": "en-clean_someone's_clock-en-verb-OTr1NAGO",
      "links": [
        [
          "defeat",
          "defeat"
        ],
        [
          "decisively",
          "decisively"
        ],
        [
          "fight",
          "fight"
        ],
        [
          "competition",
          "competition"
        ],
        [
          "negotiation",
          "negotiation"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic, informal) To defeat someone decisively, in a physical fight or other competition or negotiation."
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "fix someone's clock"
        },
        {
          "word": "mop the floor with somebody"
        },
        {
          "word": "trounce"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic",
        "informal"
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "code": "nl",
          "lang": "Dutch",
          "sense": "defeat decisively",
          "word": "met iemand de vloer aanvegen"
        },
        {
          "code": "nl",
          "lang": "Dutch",
          "sense": "defeat decisively",
          "word": "iemand uitschakelen"
        },
        {
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "defeat decisively",
          "word": "battre à plate couture"
        },
        {
          "code": "ru",
          "lang": "Russian",
          "roman": "razdélatʹ pod oréx",
          "sense": "defeat decisively",
          "word": "разде́лать под оре́х"
        },
        {
          "code": "ru",
          "lang": "Russian",
          "roman": "razmázatʹ po sténke",
          "sense": "defeat decisively",
          "word": "разма́зать по сте́нке"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "en-au-clean someone's clock.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/a/ad/En-au-clean_someone%27s_clock.ogg/En-au-clean_someone%27s_clock.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ad/En-au-clean_someone%27s_clock.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "Australia"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (AU)"
    }
  ],
  "word": "clean someone's clock"
}
{
  "derived": [
    {
      "word": "get one's clock cleaned"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "clock face"
      },
      "expansion": "clock face",
      "name": "m"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "Originally military slang; perhaps from clock face.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "cleans someone's clock",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "cleaning someone's clock",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "cleaned someone's clock",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "cleaned someone's clock",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "*"
      },
      "expansion": "clean someone's clock (third-person singular simple present cleans someone's clock, present participle cleaning someone's clock, simple past and past participle cleaned someone's clock)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English entries with topic categories using raw markup",
        "English idioms",
        "English informal terms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English terms with audio links",
        "English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
        "English terms with quotations",
        "English verbs",
        "en:Violence"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1997 November 12, Richard W. Stevenson, “Executives Say Trade Bill Defeat Will Hurt Economy”, in New York Times, retrieved 2008-10-07",
          "text": "\"When big business goes head to head with unions, the unions clean their clock,\" said one Republican aide in Congress.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2007 April 28, Carla Marinucci, “Hillary on a roll”, in San Francisco Chronicle, retrieved 2008-10-07",
          "text": "Barack Obama cleaned her clock in the debates.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2008 September 27, Jake Donovan, “Vicente Escobedo Rallies, Stops Dominic Salcido In Six”, in BoxingScene.com, retrieved 2008-10-07",
          "text": "The heavily-tattooed Perez never recovered, getting nailed with flush head shots before a clean-up left hook cleaned his clock.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To defeat someone decisively, in a physical fight or other competition or negotiation."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "defeat",
          "defeat"
        ],
        [
          "decisively",
          "decisively"
        ],
        [
          "fight",
          "fight"
        ],
        [
          "competition",
          "competition"
        ],
        [
          "negotiation",
          "negotiation"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic, informal) To defeat someone decisively, in a physical fight or other competition or negotiation."
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "fix someone's clock"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic",
        "informal"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "en-au-clean someone's clock.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/a/ad/En-au-clean_someone%27s_clock.ogg/En-au-clean_someone%27s_clock.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ad/En-au-clean_someone%27s_clock.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "Australia"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (AU)"
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "mop the floor with somebody"
    },
    {
      "word": "trounce"
    }
  ],
  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "nl",
      "lang": "Dutch",
      "sense": "defeat decisively",
      "word": "met iemand de vloer aanvegen"
    },
    {
      "code": "nl",
      "lang": "Dutch",
      "sense": "defeat decisively",
      "word": "iemand uitschakelen"
    },
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "defeat decisively",
      "word": "battre à plate couture"
    },
    {
      "code": "ru",
      "lang": "Russian",
      "roman": "razdélatʹ pod oréx",
      "sense": "defeat decisively",
      "word": "разде́лать под оре́х"
    },
    {
      "code": "ru",
      "lang": "Russian",
      "roman": "razmázatʹ po sténke",
      "sense": "defeat decisively",
      "word": "разма́зать по сте́нке"
    }
  ],
  "word": "clean someone's clock"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-03 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.