boots

Pluralbootses

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of boot.

   The hikers laced their boots tight for the long climb ahead.

   A row of muddy boots stood drying by the back door.

   Note

   A regular plural, though it follows only the countable meanings of the noun: heavy shoes, football and cricket shoes, the rubber covers that guard a lever or shaft, and the old torture devices. A kick is uncountable, and the figurative oppressor is always "the boot," so neither is normally pluralized. Several other nouns with this spelling are singular, such as the hotel servant.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present indicative of boot.

   The technician boots the server remotely whenever it freezes overnight.

   The bouncer boots anyone who starts a fight straight out the door.

   Note

   The verb form that shares its spelling with the plural noun: she boots the ball, but her boots are muddy. Context does the sorting, since the verb ranges from kicking and pulling on riding boots to throwing someone out, whether off a server or out of a chat. In slang it can mean vomiting, and in the US and Canada it can mean stepping hard on the accelerator.

3. 3
   adverb

   Placed after an adjective as an intensifier, meaning to an extreme or exceptional degree.

   Her runway walk was fierce boots, and the crowd went wild.

   The whole set was flawless boots from the first number to the last.

   Similarvery, extremely, really, completely, highly

   Note

   Drag slang that comes after what it strengthens rather than before it: fierce boots, never boots fierce. It can follow a whole verb phrase, as when a queen sets out to "dance the house down boots," and it can stand alone as a predicate, as in pride-parade pictures "that are boots." It has no comparative, so nothing is more boots than anything else.

4. 4
   nounslangJamaicaplural

   A condom, worn during sex to prevent pregnancy or sexually transmitted infection.

   By the time they reached the hotel, he realized he'd forgotten to bring boots.

   She kept a small stash of boots in the bedside drawer.

   Similarcondom, rubber

   Note

   Jamaican slang that only ever takes the plural form, whether one condom is meant or several. Black Uhuru's song "Abortion" (1980) builds a line on it, in which the singer would rather get rid of them and have a child. It belongs to casual talk within that speech community. Elsewhere listeners may hear only footwear, so in formal or international settings the plain word condom is the safe choice.

5. 5
   nounslangUK

   The ship in a fleet whose captain is the most junior.

   Being the boots, his vessel anchored last and sailed at the rear of the formation.

   The admiral handed the dullest escort runs to the boots of his squadron.

   Note

   Fleet slang with a long memory. The Life of William III (1705) already speaks of "the Boots of the Fleet," and Frank Wade's A Midshipman's War (2005) says Hotspur was "the 'boots' of the fleet." The word usually comes in that frame and takes a singular verb. The rank brought a practical consequence: the junior ship was given the jobs no one else wanted.

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