adjective

• 1informal Cheerfully casual in a careless or irresponsible way.

  More example sentences

  • ‘he possessed slap-happy courage’
  • ‘One year after being slapped down by Bush's re-election, why are Hollywood liberals being so slap-happy now?’
  • ‘Contrary to what my slap-happy friend might expect, Laura Doyle doesn't look like a monster - or a doormat.’
  • ‘What's more, as individuals we tend to be very slap-happy about who's in and who's out of our own particular family.’
  • ‘‘We'll all have to be on constant code red to prevent him from exploiting me in one of his slap-happy sitcoms.’’

  Synonyms

  happy-go-lucky, devil-may-care, carefree, cheerful, breezy, easy-going, nonchalant, insouciant, blithe, airy, casual, irresponsible

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  1. 1.1(of an action or operation) unmethodical; poorly thought out.
     More example sentences

     • ‘slap-happy surveying methods’
     • ‘We believe there will be a downward spiral with this Government's policy, because it is a slap-happy, haphazard policy that is trying to bring in 45,000-plus people.’
     • ‘Mr Tyler said: ‘Many Gulf veterans who have developed serious illnesses since have given us evidence of administration of vaccines which was at best slap-happy and at worst irresponsible.’’
     • ‘With a slap-happy attitude to hygiene, and a proclivity towards being ‘influenced’ by others, the sign is traditionally associated with scabies, lice and skin infections caused by contamination.’
     • ‘The band's slap-happy power chords now replaced by the real thing: minor A's and major G's, smoothed out under too many plinking piano leads.’
     • ‘In an era of the steady, dour beat of half-court offenses and slap-happy defenses, this Carolina team sings a pretty nostalgic song.’
     • ‘I would be deeply concerned if my very ability to exist in this country depended upon the slap-happy approach that has characterised Government IT projects to date.’
     • ‘Community work has become a byword for slap-happy mismanagement of people's sentences.’
     Synonyms

     careless, slapdash, slipshod, lackadaisical, disorganized, haphazard, unmethodical, unsystematic, hit-or-miss, untidy, messy, thoughtless, inattentive, heedless, hasty, hurried

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• 2North American informal Dazed or stupefied by or as if by a series of blows to the head; punch-drunk.

  More example sentences

  • ‘she's a bit slap-happy after such a narrow escape’
  • ‘I could feel this slap-happy punch-drunk idiot grin appear on my face, widening exponentially.’
  • ‘We're exhausted - and more than a little slap-happy.’
  • ‘For several minutes, in my slap-happy, sleep-deprived state, I responded with lots of laughter and giggles.’
  • ‘Yeah, I'm quite slap happy tonight!’

  Synonyms

  dazed, stupefied, punch-drunk, unsteady, wobbly

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