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The Collaborative International Dictionary
goldbrick

goldbrick \gold"brick`\ n. an idle worthless person. [slang]

Syn: goof-off, ne'er-do-well, good-for-nothing, good-for-naught.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
goldbrick

"shirker," 1914, World War I armed forces slang, from earlier verb meaning "to swindle, cheat" (1902) from the old con game of selling spurious "gold" bricks (attested by 1882).

Wiktionary
goldbrick

alt. 1 A gold brick, ''especially'' one that is fraudulent or nonexistent; (non-gloss definition: also used figuratively,) a swindle, a con. 2 (context US slang dated English) A shirker or malingerer 3 (context US slang dated English) A swindler n. 1 A gold brick, ''especially'' one that is fraudulent or nonexistent; (non-gloss definition: also used figuratively,) a swindle, a con. 2 (context US slang dated English) A shirker or malingerer 3 (context US slang dated English) A swindler vb. 1 (context US slang dated English) To shirk or malinger 2 (context US slang dated English) To swindle

WordNet
goldbrick
  1. n. a soldier who performs his duties without proper care or effort

  2. an idle worthless person [syn: goof-off, ne'er-do-well, good-for-nothing, good-for-naught]

  3. a brick-shaped block that looks like gold but is not

  4. anything that is supposed to be valuable but turns out to be worthless

  5. v. deprive of by deceit; "He swindled me out of my inheritance"; "She defrauded the customers who trusted her"; "the cashier gypped me when he gave me too little change" [syn: victimize, swindle, rook, nobble, diddle, bunco, defraud, scam, mulct, gyp, con]

  6. avoid (one's assigned duties); "The derelict soldier shirked his duties" [syn: fiddle, shirk, shrink from]

Usage examples of "goldbrick".

To Mark, with a long experience of their kind gained in his travels and time as a law officer, they spelled cheap tinhorn card shark, goldbrick salesmen, or petty thief.

No, Peter, agents have to be dropped in the dark, and for the time being that puts us into the hands ofthe British, including that pretentious goldbrick we just talked with.

Three wheelchairs, their people mighty frail, two Wacs, both tough little princesses, one fused spine, three mental blanks who drooled, two bedridden, one goldbrick, two mobile but getting over operations, a bosun mate with one arm and an appliance instead of a hand, and a blind quartermaster .

Milo had figured the guy for a late-sleeping pension-sniffing goldbrick and turned out the sonofabitch had been working overtime, doing a solo act, and producing.

Beneath the shimmery surface was a dull bog in which one big-eyed carp named Warner peddled goldbricks to passing rubes.

Jake was not above sleeping in or goldbricking while his wife bore the burden of feeding their step-ladder of seven kids.

The sergeant played the role of martinet extremely well, abiding no goldbricking from his men.

Da Gomny Gmandr will inspect to-morrow all of it so you want to do it right and none of the goldbricking I want to see.

We chiseled, stole, malingered, goldbricked, and generally made ourselves as comfortable as we could.

He was the worst goldbricker we've ever had in this place and on top of that he was queer -- now that he's gone I think we'll be all right.

Of course the moment the camera was moved they went back to a much more sensible, goldbricking pace, but for the few feet of film we have, the boxes shot by and piled up in a mountain out of camera range.

Besides, for every screaming egotist there was a Bradley, and for every publicity-mad military ham there were great men like Terry Allen and General Roosevelt, while in the ranks, billeted with the stinking, cheating, foul-mouthed goldbricks, there were true heroes, kindly men, intelligent men who knew or thought they knew what they were fighting for and took all the rest in their stride.

In the daytime he speaks his brisk business German, to which vestiges of military jargon lend pithiness and time-saving succinctness: "Let's cut the goldbricking, let's wade in!

Decker tweezered another black-and-white of the goldbrick fireman out of the fixer and rinsed it down.

He was liked by all his good sailors, and heartily cussed by the salt-water equivalent of the Army goldbricker.