Skip to main content

Navvy Gravvy 

Unlike Itsy Bitsy and Teeny Weeny, Navvy Gravvy doesn't refer to just a small size but to a small amount. A navvy gravy is a very small amount, a little tiny bit, a very fine shaving. In common use within the Royal Dockyards where very small adjustments have to be made, by shipwrights and shipfitters, to customise components in order to get them to fit correctly. Thought to date from around the mid-nineteenth century when many tasks in shipbuilding were still carried out by 'eye', although the origins or the words themselves are not entirely clear, it is still in use today where non-standard sized items have to be adjusted to fit.
As an illustration; if a hole is drilled in a piece of metal to take a bolt, the hole is the correct size but the bolt doesn't fit. The drill is then run through the hole again and the bolt fits. Careful examination may reveal a few grains of metal dust or the tiniest finest curl of swarf removed by the drill, that tiny amount is a navvy gravvy.
"If we just take a navvy gravvy off that leading edge, it'll fit perfect."
Navvy Gravvy by AKACroatalin April 19, 2015
Related Words
when you're so excited that words just can't express your excitement, then you're grovvy.
"Yo, I got tickets to the Sublime tribute concert!!"
"Oh my God, I'm so grovvy for it!!!"
grovvy by Teenali April 16, 2007
The word 'flag' as pronounced by people with thick Belfast accents. The term is a perfect encapsulation of the disproportionate and overblown reaction to the removal of the Union Jack (as in 'de fleg') from above City Hall in Belfast. Where previously it had flown for 365 days per year, it is now flown on 17 designated days of the year - in line with many other British cities.

The event caused a portion of the Protestant community ('fleggers') to make international pricks of themselves as they proceeded to wreck the fucking place, claiming it was another erosion of a 'British' identity they perceive to have been under attack since the horrifying spectre of equality reared its head in Northern Ireland.

The word 'fleg' - and indeed 'fleggers' - fittingly describes a section of humanity unconcerned with knowledge, reality or the vagaries of the English language. Like America's tea-baggers they are ruled by instinct, fear and paranoia with a side dish of rampant bigotry and startling ignorance of the world around them.
"Wat de fuck like! The taigs got de fleg took down! Let's wreck de fuckin place! No surrender!"

"De fleg has been took down! Before ye know it there'll be a united Ireland! Attack Short Strand! God Save The Queen!"
Fleg by OnionFleg August 9, 2013
Word of the Day on July 18, 2026
To take something small, that doesn't quite qualify as a theft. Probably from the Danish "skæv" or the Dutch "scheef", both of which are pronounced similarly, meaning "askew, or not quite right'. To change an item's ownership without permission, but only something small and of little worth.
"I skeefed an apple off the neighbor's tree." "I skeefed some chips outta your bag when you looked away." "Don't skeef my chair when I go to the bathroom."
Skeef by kachinaflonk July 16, 2026
Word of the Day on July 17, 2026

Hair spider

A tight, tangled knot of loose hair and lint that forms inside clothing during the clothes dryer cycle. It typically hides inside garments, causing an annoying lump or a phantom tickling sensation against the skin until it is found or falls out onto the floor during folding.
I was folding my clothes and a huge hair spider fell out onto my hand
Hair spider by Kmorsels July 15, 2026
Word of the Day on July 16, 2026
n. A screenshot fabricated by a company to misrepresent the graphics of a game; a combination of the words bullshit and screenshot.

Originated from Penny Arcade, a popular gaming webcomic.
-Have you seen Madden 2006 for the Xbox 360? The graphics are gonna be awesome!
-Dude, the Madden 2006 images they showed at E3 were bullshots. It doesn't look nearly as good as they said.
bullshot by Worker Unit #503,298,545 September 26, 2005
Word of the Day on July 15, 2026