# earlies

Pronunciation: say "UR-leez" US /ˈɝliz/, UK /ˈɜːliz/

## Noun

1. Early shifts in a job that rotates its staff through different start times. *(colloquial)*
   - Simple: Work shifts that begin early in the day, in a job where the hours keep changing.
   - _He prefers earlies because he can finish by early afternoon._
   - _The roster put me on earlies for two weeks, then nights after that._
2. Potatoes harvested early in the season, before the main crop is ready to lift.
   - Simple: Potatoes that are dug up early in the year, before the main crop is ready.
   - _We planted earlies in March to have new potatoes by midsummer._
   - _The first earlies were ready to dig well ahead of the rest of the rows._

## Origin

Formed from "early" combined with the suffix "-s".

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/earlies (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).