blue streak

noun

A great deal of fast talking, cursing, lying, or similar.

“to talk a blue streak”

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Meanings

noun
  1. informalA great deal of fast talking, cursing, lying, or similar.

    to talk a blue streak

    4 more examples

    interspersing his vehement comments with a ‘blue streak’ of oaths

    1847, The Knickerbocker, page 178

    He calmly lied to me a blue streak, and he knew that I knew he was lying

    1895 September, The Century Magazine, page 676

    This old maid, she had a parrot that cursed a blue streak and knew more vulgar expressions than Mr. Kowalski.

    1951, Tennessee Williams, Oscar Saul, A Streetcar Named Desire, spoken by Blanche (Vivien Leigh)

    If you leave your dog alone in your backyard for hours at a time, he may be barking a blue streak, too.

    2007, Sue Owens Wright, 150 Activities For Bored Dogs
  2. A trace left by something that is too quick to see.

    Now then, watch me leave a blue streak behind!

    1907, Mark Twain, A Horse's Tale
    5 more examples

    To pass[…] with such rapidity as not even to leave a ‘blue streak’ behind him

    1830 May 14, Kentuckian, page 2/5

    An American engineer, who had been in England, described the Express train from Liverpool to London as running a "blue streak," by which he meant going like lightning.

    1867, James Howard, A Trip to America: Two Lectures, page 35

    Running like a blue streak from your old mammy.

    1977, Dick D'Easum, Sawtooth Tales, page 273

    She was wild and crazy, and she could run a blue streak.

    2006, Mignon C. Reynolds, Life as Bonkers, page 13

    He (the suspect) should know better than to run from my partner Leroy, for he's like a blue streak.

    2014, Leroy Stover, Birmingham First Black in Blue

Origin

From the afterimage of a stroke of lightning, which looks like a blue streak across the sky.

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

blue streak. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/blue%20streak

MLA

“blue streak.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/blue%20streak. Accessed November 4, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “blue streak,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/blue%20streak.

Source: blue streak on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.