tight-assed

Definitions

1. 1

   Rigidly maintaining self-control

   Rigidly maintaining self-control; restricting oneself to generally accepted rules and behaviours.

   • Assemblyperson Baker, as she probably liked to be addressed, had all the lyricism and sensuality of Betty Crocker. She was so tight-assed that she even wore stockings in the tropics.
   • This noncritical atmosphere works for us because the three of us are so tight assed about revealing our emotions.
   • A group of pedestrians waited on the corner opposite for the lights to change even though there was no traffic coming in either direction. After watching them for a while Hoffmann muttered savagely, ‘The goddam tight-assed Swiss...’
2. 2

   Excessively concerned with unimportant details

   Excessively concerned with unimportant details; obsessively precise.

   • […] Gottlieb obviously wishes, above all else in life, that he could turn himself into that miserable don and learn to write his spiteful-playful tight-assed vinegar prose.
   • It was a typical old brownstone, built in the fifties and since then maintained with tight-assed economy—a little paint every year, a new lock on the door, perhaps a new piece of plumbing here and there as the old rusted out.
3. 3

   Reluctant to spend money.

   • We have learned how—what do you call it?—tight-assed the white man is with his money.
   • Cuddles is the one in the money. Ain’t tight-assed about it either, which is why we hang together.
4. ›+ 3 more definitionsshow fewer

   1. 4

      Having firm or clenched buttocks.

      • He had an eagle tattooed on his chest, a tight-assed, narrow-hipped swagger, and a reputation for having fast hands and clever fingers.
      • 2015, Kimberli A. Bindschatel, Operation Tropical Affair, Traverse City, MI: Turning Leaf, Chapter 8, p. 78, We could pop down to the Caymans. Drink some margaritas, watch those tight-assed college boys play beach volleyball.
   2. 5

      Fitting tightly in the area covering the buttocks.

      • 1967, Wright Morris, In Orbit, Chapter 6, in Two for the Road, Santa Rosa: Black Sparrow Press, 1994, p. 264, There is no room in his tight-assed pants for his dangling hands.
      • […] the women wore hot pants and halter tops and tight-assed skirts.
      • The waiters were all beautiful Portuguese Nancy boys dressed in tight French sailor suits—striped shirts, tight-assed bell bottoms, a blue cap with a red pompadour—and reeking of delectably cheap perfume.
   3. 6

      In an uptight or fastidious way.

      • When he’d stopped at a saloon for a glass of skullbuster, the bar-keep had been so tight-assed snotty about serving him that he’d taken the one drink in a gulp and then cleared out.
      • they take themselves too tight-assed serious here

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