garbage

[gahr-bij]

noun

1. discarded animal and vegetable matter, as from a kitchen; refuse.

2. any matter that is no longer wanted or needed; trash.

3. a bin or other receptacle for discarded matter, especially kitchen waste; garbage can.

   Hey, who threw my leftover pizza in the garbage?

   Synonyms: taradiddle, malarkey, hogwash, claptrap, bunkum, nonsense, waste, trash, rubbish, junk, refuse, litter

4. anything that is contemptibly worthless, inferior, or vile.

   There's nothing but garbage on TV tonight.

5. worthless talk; lies; foolishness.

6. Informal.,  any unnecessary item added to something else, as for appearance only; garnish.

   I'll have an Old Fashioned, but without the garbage.

7. useless artificial satellites or parts of rockets floating in space, as satellites that are no longer transmitting information or rocket boosters jettisoned in flight.

8. Computers.,  meaningless or unwanted data.

   That program was not properly debugged and produced nothing but garbage.

garbage

/ ˈɡɑːbɪdʒ /

noun

1. worthless, useless, or unwanted matter

2. Also called: rubbish. discarded or waste matter; refuse

3. computing invalid data

4. informal,  nonsense

Word History and Origins

Origin of garbage¹

First recorded in 1400–50; Middle English garbage, gabage “discarded parts of butchered fowls; entrails of fowls used for human food”; compare with Middle English garbelage “removal of refuse from spices,” Middle English garbelure “refuse found in spices,” and Old French garbage (also jarbage ) “tax on sheaves of grain,” but the shift of sense here is unclear; further origin uncertain; garble, -age

Word History and Origins

Origin of garbage¹

C15: probably from Anglo-French garbelage removal of discarded matter, of uncertain origin; compare Old Italian garbuglio confusion

Example Sentences

He said “the garbage lending has gone to these private markets, and private credit has been very popular, and it’s now increasingly overallocated to by large asset pools.”

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And that was a week after the Chargers’ defense throttled Pittsburgh, with the Steelers going 0 for 9 on third down until garbage time.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

That means keeping food out of the 60-gallon black bins where residents have been accustomed to dumping most of their garbage, which ultimately winds up in landfills.

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“It became sort of a garbage dump for difficult-to-handle homicide cases.”

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“Thankfully, Americans can see through WSJ hot garbage—this FBI has never been stronger,” he said.

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