sticks

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of stick.

   Workers stacked the bundled sticks beside the woodshed.

   The trail was littered with broken sticks after the storm.

   Note

   The regular plural covers every countable use of the noun: twigs gathered from the ground, long lengths of wood, walking canes, police truncheons, and, in American usage, two-by-four boards. The verb has the same spelling in its present-tense form, so the surrounding words decide the meaning: a pile of sticks is a noun, and the lid sticks is a verb.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of stick.

   The gum sticks stubbornly to the bottom of the shoe.

   She rarely backs down once she sticks to a decision.

   Note

   Every sense of the verb takes this -s form after he, she or it. Glue sticks to the skin, a drawer sticks halfway, and a carpenter sticks a rail for a cope-and-stick joint. It is the only present form that adds -s; I, you, we and they simply stick. The same spelling also belongs to the noun plural.

3. 3
   nounderogatorycolloquialpluralwith the

   Remote rural country, especially wooded backcountry: any region far from towns and cities, named dismissively.

   He complained about being posted to the sticks with no decent coffee for miles.

   Their cabin sat deep in the sticks, well past the last paved road.

   Similarbackwoods, boondocks, boonies, hinterland, wilds

   Note

   This meaning works only as a fixed plural with the. People live out in the sticks, but never in a sticks. Its usual companions are out in, way out into and deep in. The phrase carries a sneer at remoteness, so it suits complaint or joking more than neutral description. Calling someone's home the sticks can sound dismissive in a way that countryside does not.

4. 4
   nouncountableplural

   Hurdles or other obstacles for horses to jump over during a race.

   The mare met every one of the sticks perfectly and won by four lengths.

   A loose horse refused at the sticks and brought down the leader.

   Similarhurdles, fences, jumps

   Note

   A racing word that only works in the plural: a single hurdle is never called a stick. Its natural home is the phrase over the sticks, which sets jump racing, meaning hurdle and steeplechase contests, apart from racing on the flat. A horse that runs over the sticks is a jumper, and a race over the sticks is a jump race.

5. 5
   nounslangcountableplural

   A slang term for crutches, used especially by people who have relied on them for a long time.

   He propped his sticks against the wall and lowered himself into the chair.

   By her tenth year on sticks, she could move faster than most people on foot.

   Similarcrutches

   Note

   An insider's word, used mostly by people who have depended on crutches for years. Like crutches, it is always plural, and it pairs naturally with on, as in years on sticks. Because it is slang, crutches remains the word for medical or formal writing. Context separates it from canes under the ordinary plural: a person with a pair of supports under the arms is on sticks.

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