deep six

Etymology

Definitions

1. 1

   To discard, get rid of, or cancel

   To discard, get rid of, or cancel; to completely put an end to something.

   • They had put many hundreds of hours into the project before it was deep-sixed by management.
   • We wonder why that mild-mannered woman we met at the faculty mixer was on the committee that came close to deep-sixing the career of a liberal professor who did nothing wrong.
2. 2

   To submerge (something) in water.

3. 3

   An ejection, discardment or destruction.

   • Otherwise when Don got in trouble he might have really got the deep six. He had a pretty level head, though, and I guess that's what saved him.
   • I look at Kenny who looks at Jimmy...the three of us join Colm; we overpower Ingy and give him the deep six.
   • Aaron was sitting up in the backseat poking his fingers at his Game Boy, behaving fairly decently since he'd been warned that if he went into any kind of tantrum or mood, the Game Boy got the deep six.
4. ›+ 1 more definitionshow fewer

   1. 4

      The grave or death

      The grave or death; also, the (notional) place where something is discarded.

      • The discretion of social conversation, even among friends, is exceeded only by the discretion of “the deep six,” that grave wherein nothing is mentioned at all.
      • Between the Brits and the Maharajas, there's pretty good reason to believe that at least 100,000 tigers got the deep six over the past hundred years.
      • Your second appointment is 15 minutes late, so you chip away at your delay reading. You scan contents and tear out articles you want to keep. Wham! The rest goes into the deep six.

The neighborhood

• neighborDavy Jones's locker
• neighboreighty-six
• neighborkick into the long grass
• neighborpull the plug
• neighborsix feet under