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loose end
noun
- a part or piece left hanging, unattached, or unused:
Remind me to tack down that loose end on the stairway carpet.
- an unsettled detail, as of a business matter:
The arrangements have been made, except for a few loose ends.
loose end
noun
- a detail that is left unsettled, unexplained, or incomplete
- at a loose endwithout purpose or occupation
Word History and Origins
Origin of loose end1
Idioms and Phrases
- at loose ends, in an uncertain or unsettled situation or position: Also at a loose end.
Ever since leaving the company, he's been at loose ends.
Example Sentences
On the standing side of the rope, create a small loop that faces the loose end of the rope.
The United States, you may not be surprised to learn, is on the loose end of the spectrum — although not in the top five.
“A loose end is one way that Isaac put it,” said Burnett at his guilty-plea hearing.
Burnett said that Aguigui called the killings a “loose end.”
He passed a miserable week, unable to work, at a loose end in London during the height of the season.
And like the young professional man at a loose end, I made a pretence of looking through papers.
Then I sat down at a loose end, very much like a young professional man, doctor or estate-agent, waiting for the next client.
The string's tangled up about as bad as it was before, but I believe you're gettin' hold of the loose end.
The loose end of the tracing line, about an inch thick, was hanging near me.
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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
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