get going

present singular third person gets going · participle present getting going · past got going · UK participle past got going · US participle past gotten going

1. intransitiveTo leave, to depart, to get moving.

   It is quite late, I'd best get going before sunset.

   1 more example

   Then he straightened up and waved a big paw. “Let’s clear out,” he called. “Let’s get going, boys.” As they had come, in ones and twos the men shuffled back to their ramshackle cars. Doors slammed, engines coughed, and they were gone.

   1960 July 11, Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird, Philadelphia, Pa.; New York, N.Y.: J[oshua] B[allinger] Lippincott Company, →OCLC

2. intransitivetransitiveTo begin or commence.

   We'd better get this project going. If we don't get going on it soon, we won't finish in time.

   1 more example

   We toted in the wood and got the fire going nice and comfortable. Lord James still set in one of the chairs and Applegate had cabbaged the other and was hugging the stove.

   1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter VIII, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC

3. transitiveTo excite intellectually.

   She got him going with all these stories, and then she'd leave him, and he'd be up all night trying to figure out the end.

   1986, Forum

   1 more example

   He [Johnson] and my father could talk shop for hours and hours, and my father got a lot of stimulation – my father was also tense and bright but more quiet, less adventurous – he needed Edgar and Edgar's strong opinions and mercilessly sharp mind to get him going.

   2014, Werner Breunig, Jürgen Wetzel, Fünf Monate in Berlin: Briefe von Edgar N. Johnson aus dem Jahre 1946, Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG, →ISBN, page 63

4. transitiveTo arouse sexually.

   During the preliminaries I, as usual, "got her going" by irritation of the clitoris, among other things.

   1948, Journal of Clinical Psychology: Monograph Supplement

   3 more examples

   "You fascinate me, Rita. In vulgar terms, you've got me going. I would love to make a doting fool of myself over you. Rhapsodize over you in a highfalutin' key of lyrical ardour."

   1950, Norman Lindsay, Dust or Polish?, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 175

   Besides, it's always seemed necessary to get him going. Now, tonight, it's more out of habit, because when I get a paw past his pants, he's already rock hard and it's clear that he got himself going without my help.

   2010, Kyell Gold, Out of Position, Kyell Gold, →ISBN, page 46

   Later Irv would claim her skin trembled—really fucking vibrated—under his hands as though she were an overcharged electric blanket, as though she could send off sparks and shock him, and how that really got him going.

   2014, Gina Frangello, A Life in Men: A Novel, Algonquin Books, →ISBN, page 278

5. intransitiveTo talk passionately without interruption.

   “He's always got a story and when he gets going, you aren't going to bring him back for a while.”

   2013, Kempton Mooney, The Committee, FKM Books, page 222

   2 more examples

   Once she got going about my wages and everything else she had to pay out. She couldn't keep the wolf from the door, she said.

   1987, Klaus Burghardt, Great Commonwealth Stories, Ernst Klett Sprachen, →ISBN, page 29

   Mo was doing most of the talking and even though he's a good guy, once he gets going about Betty you can forget it for the rest of the night.

   2013, Joe Colicchio, As Told By Monk, First Edition Design Pub., →ISBN

6. transitiveTo cause someone to talk passionately without interruption.

   The visit to La Devinière got her going about her great childhood deprivation

   2014, R J ODonnell, France, the Soul of a Journey, Troubador Publishing Ltd, →ISBN, page 110

   2 more examples

   I got him going about the moon or stars, he would fall into that trap, he forgot about his questions and for hours talked to me about the universe.

   1999, Irena Vrkljan, Sibelan Elizabeth S. Forrester, Celia Hawkesworth, The Silk, the Shears and Marina; Or, About Biography, Northwestern University Press, →ISBN, page 47

   Then she'll start in about seeing all these robins we've been having lately, and next thing vou know she's quoting 'ere a sparrow that tails and that gets her going about that king turning into a bird in Daniel.

   2009, Wayne Caldwell, Cataloochee: A Novel, Random House, →ISBN

7. intransitiveTo cry or bawl loudly.