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Grouch   Listen
verb
grouch  v. i.  To complain habitually, especially about minor or routine annoyances.
Synonyms: grumble, gripe.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Grouch" Quotes from Famous Books



... "this is no time to nurse a grouch. Perhaps they didn't get the telegram. I'll risk it. Is there a side door you ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice

... of course," said Harriet. "He's gone around all winter with a grouch and a face a mile long. What's the matter with ...
— The Efficiency Expert • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... boys were within hearing, distance. The men were not talking much, however. In fact, they both seemed to be harboring a grouch, from the infrequent low, grumbling complaints ...
— The Boy Scout Camera Club - The Confession of a Photograph • G. Harvey Ralphson

... you will see me," returned Wyn, placidly. "Or, at least, I hope you will see Bessie's mind changed, whether by my efforts, or not. Oh, dear! it's so much easier to get along pleasantly in this world if folks only thought so. Query: Why is a grouch?" ...
— Wyn's Camping Days - or, The Outing of the Go-Ahead Club • Amy Bell Marlowe

... the elevator he sighed and said: "It takes all kinds of people to make up a world—Mr. Hummockstone is wan of the t'others. He has a grouch agin the universe. Sure but he's been housin' a gnawin' serpent. How 'twill ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland

... a grouch against garden-parties, so often does he shake his sieve with deliberate intent to spoil the affair, which is after all, merely afternoon tea out of doors. The hostess anxiously consults "the probabilities" as to ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter

... seem such a grouch, but I don't like your grade of paper either. And why not enlarge the magazine to about 11" x 9" by 1/2", and charge 25 cents for your thoroughly good magazine, apart from the defects ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science September 1930 • Various

... apartment. We'll probably have quite a long wait. I've found it takes some little time to wake the head of the house and get him to the 'phone. And say, he's the darndest grouch I've ever tackled. Get's sore as a crab. But we've got him where we want him. He knows darned well if he kicks up a row, she'll quit and his wife couldn't get anybody in her place for love or money these days. I was sayin' only the other night—" Again lowering his voice: "Is ...
— Yollop • George Barr McCutcheon

... somewhere, an' why they ain't in other places. It minds me iv what happened wanst in me cousin Terence's fam'ly. They was livin' down near Healey's slough in wan iv thim ol' Doherty's houses,—not Doherty that ye know, th' j'iner, a good man whin he don't dhrink. No, 'twas an ol' grouch iv a man be th' name iv Malachi Doherty that used to keep five-day notices in his thrunk, an' ownded his own privit justice iv th' peace. Me cousin Terence was as dacint a man as iver shoed a hor-rse; an his wife was a good woman, too, though I niver took much ...
— Mr. Dooley in Peace and in War • Finley Peter Dunne

... "Mr. Grouch, I'm sorry indeed that I can't vote for you, and I'd like to be able to wish you success, but of course you know I'm on the other side and always have been and ...
— The Hohenzollerns in America - With the Bolsheviks in Berlin and other impossibilities • Stephen Leacock

... well!" Alix agreed, airily, jumping into the seat beside him. "Though what has given you a grouch I really am at a loss to imagine!" she added ...
— Sisters • Kathleen Norris

... of a successful camping-out trip are personal. One must have the receptive and acceptive spirit. No matter what comes it is for the best; an experience worth having. Nothing must be complained of. The "grouch" has no place on a camping-trip, and one who is a "grouch," a "sissy," a "faultfinder," a "worrier," a "quitter," or who cannot or will not enter fully into the spirit of the thing had ...
— The Lake of the Sky • George Wharton James

... in this man's opinion for the tendency to "grouch" that always appears in veterans who know best how to fight. Men like this were "fed up" on the war, of which they never saw anything but the glimpse of their own sector. The war was over now, and between the armistice and getting home many such men had a chance to talk, as they wearily ...
— The Masques of Ottawa • Domino

... old misanthrope. I hope some woman puts the hook into you some day. Where did you pick up the grouch? Some of your dusky princesses give ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath

... a grouch on just then,—for some reason or other,—and he answered me by throwing one of his shoes in my direction, which I hastily dodged by shoving my head under the bedclothes as ...
— The Adventures of the Eleven Cuff-Buttons • James Francis Thierry

... hated it for thirty-two years. I'll die here—and I'll hate it till I die. I ought to have been a business woman. I had a good deal of talent for tending to figures. All gone now. Some folks think I'm crazy. Guess I am. Sit and grouch. Go to church and sing hymns. Folks think I'm religious. Tut! Trying to forget washing and ironing and mending socks. Want an office of my own, and sell things. Julius never hear of it. ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis

... a grouch, Mart. For Heaven's sake, cheer up!" Wallace, rumpling and kissing his daughter, would ...
— Martie the Unconquered • Kathleen Norris

... Life must have gone hard with her. She's probably got a grouch, as the American boys over here say. We must try and do something to soften her down, and make her see things through rosier spectacles, if she and her brother join on to our party for ...
— Everyman's Land • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... would say, "I'm going to make my pile in this town. I can do it. Beale sent me to court the other morning to get the judge's signature. He had a grouch on, and wanted to put me off. You ought to have heard me jolly him. I talked right up to him! Yes, sir; you bet! Didn't I have the gall? That's the way you want to do to get along—get right in and not be afraid. I got his signature, you bet. Ah, I'm right in it with Beale; he ...
— Vandover and the Brute • Frank Norris

... made the difference in these two men? Their thoughts have made the difference. The grouch has, for years, entertained grouchy thoughts. The sunshiny man has cultivated the habit of seeing the bright side of things. That's all there ...
— Crayon and Character: Truth Made Clear Through Eye and Ear - Or, Ten-Minute Talks with Colored Chalks • B.J. Griswold

... with him in the morning about 11:30. On going over to my other man's store I found that he was still in bed. Pretty soon he came in with his before-breakfast grouch. It was afternoon before I got him over to my sample room. Meantime I had gone to sell another man and sold him a bunch of children's and misses' goods—such stuff as a clothing house has ...
— Tales of the Road • Charles N. Crewdson

... discomfiture, "that only proves that he was here then. He may be a hundred miles off by this time. Still, it won't do a bit of harm to keep our eyes peeled and make sure that our guns are in good working order. He's probably got a perpetual grouch, and he might be peevish if he should turn up and find us poaching on ...
— Bert Wilson in the Rockies • J. W. Duffield

... and he set his elbows on his knees and proceeded to nurse his private grouch in silence, quite excluding his companion from his thoughts. Now that he had been snatched so summarily from his hateful position on board the Olenia, his desire to leave her was not so keen. After Mayo's declaration to the owner, Marston might readily conclude ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day

... the men more than usual, and barely polite to Miss West and me when we chance to address him. His replies are grunted in monosyllables, and his face is set in superlative sourness. Miss West who is unaware of the occurrence, laughs and calls it a "sea grouch"—a phenomenon with which she ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London

... of it?" said Mr. Spike in my ear. "Nothin' but an old stone barn, where he can set all day nursin' a grouch and keepin' his daughter Anita—they do say he does—under lock and key for fear somebody's goin' to marry her ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough

... for later by the fact that the ton rate had been jumped a couple of cents. And now it had been almost doubled. No wonder he wanted a confab with Marcus T. on the subject. And, from where I stood, it looked like he ought to have it, grouch ...
— The House of Torchy • Sewell Ford

... fox-trot your grouch away with Shine Taylor. Here comes the wine I ordered—What's your name, girlie? Where did ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball

... the distinction between a grouch caused by a cootie-lined bunk and a desire to place a bomb ...
— The Story of The American Legion • George Seay Wheat

... chronic rheumatism? I know what chronic means. It means it keeps goin' without stoppin'—the rheumatism, I mean, not the folks that's got it. THEY don't go at all, sometimes. Old Dr. Cole don't, and that's what he's got. But when I asked ma what a grouch was, she said little boys should be seen and not heard. Ma always says that when she don't want to answer my questions. Do you? Have you got ...
— Oh, Money! Money! • Eleanor Hodgman Porter

... that! Who minds a little walk in the rain? I wouldn't be such a granny. You've done nothing but fuss ever since the tent came down. Nobody else has howled a minute. You must enjoy being everlastingly in a grouch." ...
— Strawberry Acres • Grace S. Richmond

... are ways and ways of earning it, and ways and ways of spending it! The fellow who knows all about that side of her is the barber Cupido. He imagines he's an artist, because he plays the guitar; and besides he has a Republican grouch, and was a great admirer of her father's. He's the only one in town who followed all she was up to, in the papers. They say she doesn't sing under her own name, but uses some prettier sounding one—foreign, I believe. Cupido is a regular busybody and you can get all the ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... all ready to be friends, bless their dear little hearts. As for the boys, I'll venture to say we can patch up a treaty of peace with them. If you will promise to be a little less free with that stick and not get a grouch on you every time a boy looks your way, they will promise to play no more tricks. If they don't promise, I'll give every mother's son of them Hail Columbia when I come this way again," and by his looks, the boys knew he meant what he said. They ...
— A Dear Little Girl's Thanksgiving Holidays • Amy E. Blanchard

... pick up flesh and strength fast enough—it's that slush you've got on board that's getting my grouch. I'd rather you had a natural death, kid. I've taken a liking to you; and ...
— Joyce of the North Woods • Harriet T. Comstock

... there is so much of Mademoiselle Simone in my story of Cagnes, and why the Artist had a grouch. His afternoon's work should have pleased him, should have satisfied him. He would not have finished it had he met Mademoiselle Simone. He knows more of Cagnes than I do, but he would rather have known ...
— Riviera Towns • Herbert Adams Gibbons

... a moment, when she made allowances for him, that she thought of writing, making it easy for him to drop his grouch and return. But here Aurora felt a difficulty. Aurora thought well, in a general way, of her powers as a letter-writer, and she was proud of her beautifully legible Spencerian hand; but for such a letter as she wished to send Gerald fine shades of expression were needed ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall

... card on his desk that says, "Do it Now," and so he lays down his book with a patient sigh, and comes back to it with a patent grouch. ...
— Back Home • Eugene Wood

... Far East, too—even the one little corner of it that we've seen," retorted Sergeant Hal. "Don't be a grouch or a knocker, Noll. Own up that you wouldn't start for the United States to-morrow if you were offered double pay ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys in the Philippines - or, Following the Flag against the Moros • H. Irving Hancock

... could hear that old grouch shouting about Bridgeboro and our river and saying it was Sleepy Hollow and Dopeville, and the river was a mud hole. But it isn't ...
— Roy Blakeley • Percy Keese Fitzhugh

... save it. You ought to thank the old grouch for calling you up. He put two secret service men on the train with Flynn? Just like Hite. You'll have to admit that it takes a newspaper man ...
— Death Points a Finger • Will Levinrew

... Comp'ny G; You could sing and tell stories the whole night long, but never a cuss gave he. You could feed him turkey at Christmastime—and Tony the cook's no slouch— But Jim wouldn't join in "Three cheers for the cook!" Gosh, but he had a grouch! ...
— The Stars & Stripes, Vol 1, No 1, February 8, 1918, - The American Soldiers' Newspaper of World War I, 1918-1919 • American Expeditionary Forces

... wasn't of a pretty decent sort? Did you ever know of a man who loved pie—who'd go out of his way to get pie—that didn't have a heart in him bigger than a pumpkin? I guess you didn't. If a man's got a good stomach he isn't a grouch, and he won't stick a knife into your back; but if he eats from habit—or necessity—he isn't a beautiful character in the eyes of nature, and there's pretty sure to be a cog loose somewhere in his makeup. I'm a grub-scientist, David. I warn you of that before we get off at Thoreau's. I ...
— The Courage of Marge O'Doone • James Oliver Curwood

... show me the guy that you've got the grouch at. I've neglected my talents as a scrapper heretofore, but this is my ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry

... occur to him that this was merely the doctor's way of saying that Charley had handled the situation about as well as he could have done it himself. Evidently the forester did not propose to enlighten Charley, for all he said was, "Don't let him worry you, Charley. He's just naturally lazy and a grouch. He doesn't like it because I made him hustle for once, and he's disappointed not to find Jim at the point of death. These doctors are strange animals, Charley. But with all their faults we love them still." And he slapped the physician ...
— The Young Wireless Operator—As a Fire Patrol - The Story of a Young Wireless Amateur Who Made Good as a Fire Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss

... grouch get richer quicker than the friendly sort of man? Can the grumbler labor better than the cheerful fellow can? Is the mean and churlish neighbor any cleverer than the one Who shouts a glad "good morning," and ...
— A Heap o' Livin' • Edgar A. Guest

... in a kindly tone, and then, edging nearer to his prime young favorite, he half-whispered: "Keep your eye on this grouch of a Fogg." ...
— Ralph on the Overland Express - The Trials and Triumphs of a Young Engineer • Allen Chapman

... they would taste. I tried out the club. I may have imagined it, but I thought my old friends lacked interest in my advent at the table. One of them said: "Oh, for Heaven's sake, take a drink! You've got a terrible grouch on." ...
— Cutting It out - How to get on the waterwagon and stay there • Samuel G. Blythe

... forget," Sol replied. "Klein'll be glad to hear it. You know, Mawruss, Klein ain't such a grouch as most people think he is. In fact, taking him all around, Klein is a pretty ...
— Potash & Perlmutter - Their Copartnership Ventures and Adventures • Montague Glass

... Corporal Shrimp any more than you have to," advised one of the uniformed rookies, coming over to them after a few moments. "Shrimp is a terror and a grouch all the time. Sergeant Brimmer you'll find a real old soldier, and a gentleman all ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys in the Ranks - or, Two Recruits in the United States Army • H. Irving Hancock

... noticed from the moment he had got out of bed that something was amiss with the world. Either he was in the grip of some divine discontent due to the highly developed condition of his soul, or else he had a grouch. One of the two. Or it might have been the reaction from the emotions of the previous night. On the morning after an opening your sensitive artist is always apt to feel as if he had been dried over ...
— A Damsel in Distress • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... Maurice; and though, of course, the poignancy of shame lessened after a while, it left its imprint on his face, as well as on his mind. They speculated about it at the office: "'G. Washington's' got a grouch on," one clerk said; "probably told the truth and lost a transfer! Let's ...
— The Vehement Flame • Margaret Wade Campbell Deland

... eat hurriedly; chew the food properly. 2. Don't overload the stomach. 3. Don't eat green or overripe fruit. 4. Don't eat anything while away from camp or barracks, whose materials or manner of preparation seem questionable. 5. Don't bring a "grouch" to the table with you. 6. Don't eat on the march; don't drink too much ...
— Military Instructors Manual • James P. Cole and Oliver Schoonmaker

... you this production is an experiment, a novelty? We shall but show Macbeth as it might have been costumed at the court of King James. In the clothes of the day, but gaudier, as was then the stage fashion. Hold, dove, I've somewhat for thee." He fumbled his grouch bag from under his doublet and dipped finger and thumb in it, and put in my palm a silver model of the Empire State Building, charm bracelet size, and one of the ...
— No Great Magic • Fritz Reuter Leiber

... "I guess you don't know New York. But if you've got a grouch against this scheme we'll try the other one. It's a sure thing. But it'll cost ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry

... just said about him and his chains!" cried Bobby. "'He's got nonskid-chains on his wheels to-day, all right.' Didn't you hear him? And he's had a grouch against Pretty Sweet ever since the time—about—that the ...
— The Girls of Central High Aiding the Red Cross - Or Amateur Theatricals for a Worthy Cause • Gertrude W. Morrison

... most anywheres," he reflected. "This here's a swell head with a grouch. I reckon he ain't a serious friend of hers, or she wouldn't have stood for me rescuin' her when he offered himself that generous." The recollection convulsed him, and he bowed his head over the pony's neck to hide the laugh. When ...
— The Range Boss • Charles Alden Seltzer

... 'Got a grouch tonight, haven't you? You seem all flittered up about something. What's the trouble? Sore about my not showing up at your apartment? I'll ...
— The Little Nugget • P.G. Wodehouse

... blistered hands nothing would have remained to show what a hard pull we had yesterday, excepting the unpleasant feeling that I made rather a donkey of myself last evening. My only excuse, and a mighty poor one, is that I was rather played out and developed a silly grouch. ...
— Sweetapple Cove • George van Schaick



Words linked to "Grouch" :   crabby person, kick, quetch, sound off, grumble, disagreeable person, unpleasant person, misanthropist, crosspatch, complain, fire-eater, grouchy, scold, hothead



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