cat

What it means

1. 1.

   Awful, dreadful. Applies to weather, performances, food and moods, and has nothing to do with cats.

In use

• The weather was cat all week.

• I'm feeling cat after last night.

  Note: Common in Leinster and the midlands; a Dubliner may use it, a Corkonian usually won't.

Where it comes from

Generally explained as a clipping of 'cat melodeon', two noises held to be equally unbearable, and sometimes as a reshaping of Irish 'cat mara' ('sea cat', a misfortune). Both are plausible, neither is settled, and speakers today have no idea either way.

Other forms

Spellings and variants:

cat melodeon, cat altogether