dingy

comparative dingier · superlative dingiest

1. Dark, dull.

   The station has been refurbished both at ground level and below ground, where the wide, fluorescently lit platforms are an almost unrecognisable metamorphosis of the dingy, reeking Low Level of old.

   1960 December, “The Glasgow Suburban Electrification is opened”, in Trains Illustrated, page 713

   1 more example

   “[…] But are you prepared to abandon the most sacred duties of life, and come and sing with us?” “Oh, yes,” said Lucy, laughing. “If you will look out the ‘Beggar’s Opera’ from the large canterbury. It has a dingy cover.”

   1860, George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss, Edinburgh: William Blackwood and Sons

   Synonyms: drab, gloomy, dreary, dismal, bland, colourless, dim, dull · Antonyms: bright

2. Shabby, squalid, uncared-for.

   She's looking from Tarquin to Fenella with shining eyes, and I look at the picture interestedly over her shoulder. But to be honest, I can't say I'm impressed. For a start it's really dingy – all sludgy greens and brown

   2009, Sophie Kinsella, The Secret Dreamworld Of A Shopaholic: (Shopaholic Book 1)

   2 more examples

   He led her through dingy wareroom after wareroom, counting-house after counting-house, where the clerks all were silent and subdued. He led her at last into a dingy sanctum, dimly lighted by one shaded lamp. In this safe there were piles of dingy papers and more dingy ledgers; […]

   1853 Christmas, [George Augustus Sala], “Over the Way’s Story”, in Charles Dickens, editor, Another Round of Stories by the Christmas Fire. Being the Extra Christmas Number of Household Words. […], London, page 15, column 2

   At last the first glimpse from a bridge of an open-top red bus, and a noticeable darkening of the atmosphere from the smoke of London: then the increasingly dingy stations with double-barrel names, set amid what has always been to me the outstanding feature of the "Premier Line" approach to London—the positively marvellous display of crazy chimney-pots on the grey inner suburban houses. As many as twenty, all of varying style, standing together like ranks of jagged teeth, and providing a Dickensian back-cloth which no other route can boast.

   1951 October, R. S. McNaught, “Lines of Approach”, in Railway Magazine, page 704

   Synonyms: grimy, dirty · Antonyms: pristine

plural dingies

1. alternativeAlternative form of dinghy.

present singular third person dingies · participle present dingying · participle past dingied · past dingied

1. alternativeAlternative form of dinghy.

comparative dingier · superlative dingiest

1. informalrareResembling or characteristic of a ding (the sound).

   They was a button on that thar computer what said ‘Enter’. I pushed it ’cause I figgered it must be a doorbell. It didn’t make no dingy sound though.

   2012, Darrell Sroufe, “Modernized Newfangled Gizmos & Gadgets”, in Howdy Folks! I’m Fuster Buskins!, [Bloomington, Ind.]: Xlibris, →ISBN, page 134

   2 more examples

   I love it when they hit. You know the sound when they hit? That dingy sound, it’s like faster, and contained somehow? That’s a great sound. Happens like a fraction of a second before you know what you’ve hit, before you figure it out.

   1997, Frederick Barthelme, chapter 6, in Bob the Gambler, Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin Company, →ISBN, page 63

   I remember we had a small electronic toy that had hot lines and made dingy sounds where you tried to eat all the pellets before the boxes with yellow inside them got you. Father said this was one of the first toys ever to be made and we were awe-struck by it.

   [2008?], Colin Jacks, chapter IX, in The Manikin Textbook, Jamaica Plain, Mass.: Mister Records, →OCLC, 2nd book, page 214