skive1
/skʌɪv
/British informal
verb [no object]
Avoid work or a duty by staying away or leaving early; shirk: I skived off school [with object]: she used to skive lessons...
- If I hadn't skived off work early to go see, I'd have been angry at the waste of my time.
- You think I skived off without blogging anything today, right?
- I had said to myself that I would go to the gym after Dame G and Dr Sir T but I skived off and watched News 24 instead.
Synonyms
malinger, pretend to be ill, feign/fake illness;
play truant, truant;
avoid work, evade one's duty, shirk, skulk, idle;
North American cut
British informal bunk off, swing the lead, wag, scrimshank, dodge the column
Irish informal mitch off
North American informal goldbrick, play hookey, goof off
Australian/New Zealand informal play the wag
noun [in singular]
1An instance of avoiding work or a duty by staying away or leaving early.‘I decided to give blood because it was a good skive out of the railway and after you'd donated you got your free tea and biscuits,’ he said....
- The vast majority of the truants would readily acknowledge in the aftermath that they were only out for a skive following a wind-up on the web.
- Yes, notwithstanding all of the above, I do love the odd skive on my tod.
1.1An easy option.Tuesday and yesterday were a bit brighter and we did have a bit of a skive on Tuesday....
- The checkout girl had thought it was a good skive, especially as her break was almost due.
Derivatives
skiver
/ noun ...- Slackers and skivers everywhere should be grateful I'm not in charge.
- There may have been some skivers, although not many.
- A poll of organisers found that 80 per cent think there are too many skivers and people who should be delegates are staying away.
Synonyms
malingerer, shirker, work-dodger, idler, layabout
informal do-nothing, slacker, cyberslacker, passenger
British informal lead-swinger, scrimshanker
North American informal gold brick, goof-off
Australian/New Zealand informal bludger
French archaic fainéant
Origin
Late 19th century (originally US college slang): probably from French esquiver 'slink away'.
Rhymes
skive2
/skʌɪv/verb [with object] technical
Pare (the edge of a piece of leather or other material) so as to reduce its thickness: to join two ends of a strap, the ends are skived...
- Bitspower's skiving technique seems a great way to remove the thermal junction between base and fins.
Origin
Early 19th century: from Old Norse skífa; related to shive.