Meanings
on the pat and mick1
- Alternative letter-case form of on the Pat and Mick.
on the Pat and Mick2
alternative on the pat and mick
- CockneyslangSick; out of commission due to being unwell.
Things are very different when you are off on the sick. . . . For a start, when you are on the Pat and Mick you no longer go to work.
1981 October 2, Jack McLean, “Limping along the road to recovery”, in Glasgow Herald, Scotland, retrieved 10 Aug 20152 more examples
I'm on the pat and mick at the mo. Only went to town to see my mother off on the train, as she'd come down for the weekend to cheer me up.
2008 July 22, Daisy Dart, “Re: Fatal bus accident in Leeds”, in Bus and Coach Forum, UK, retrieved 10 Aug 2015While lifting the SD1's battery the handle came off. . . . [I]t then bounced and landed on my foot—good job I was wearing my toetectors otherwise I would have spent Christmas on the pat and mick.
2013 Dec. 8, Bren, "Dropped car battery," autoshite.com Motoring chat forum (UK) (retrieved 10 Aug 2015)Synonyms: laid up
Synonyms & antonyms
prepositional phraseSick; out of commission due to being unwell.
Origin
Rhyming slang for on the sick. Pat and Mick are stereotypical Irish names.
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
on the pat and mick. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/on%20the%20pat%20and%20mick
“on the pat and mick.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/on%20the%20pat%20and%20mick. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “on the pat and mick,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/on%20the%20pat%20and%20mick.
Source: on the pat and mick on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.