Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A somewhat eccentric man, especially an old one.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A mean, miserly man.
- noun An old fellow; an odd person; a character: usually with old: as, a rum old codger.
- noun A fellow; a chap: a familiar term of address, used in a slighting way.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun A miser or mean person.
- noun colloq. A singular or odd person; -- a familiar, humorous, or depreciatory appellation.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun An amusingly
eccentric orgrumpy and usuallyelderly man.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun used affectionately to refer to an eccentric but amusing old man
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
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Examples
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The so-called codger representing besieged law and order is Sheriff Ed Tom Bell, played by Tommy Lee Jones with the kind of wit and assurance that reveals a master actor at the top of his game.
No Country for Old Men William Harryman 2007
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He grinned, too, did Jacko, with an intensity and frequency that induced the sailors at first to call him a clever dog, in the belief that his perception of the ludicrous was very strong indeed; but as his grins were observed to occur quite as frequently at the pathetic and the grave as at the comical parts of the stories, they changed their minds, and said he was a "codger" -- in which remark they were undoubtedly safe, seeing that it committed them to nothing very specific.
The Red Eric 1859
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For reasons I can't quite fathom, in most of these movies the codger is a magician, an obvious example being the Dumbledore / Harry connection in the newest frachise entry "
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As for Up, Pixar's 10th outing, which opens May 29, about a cranky codger and an overeager Asian kid who fly off to South America in a house hoisted by helium balloons, it will likely be the first film that all three — father, mother and child, who turns 2 today — enjoy together.
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Yup, that's right, that spunky young bin man whose YouTube rap sensation condemns the health secretary, Andrew Lansley born in 1956, as a "grey-haired manky old codger" is cutting short his lifespan just as surely as if he were sucking on a crack pipe while leaping Becher's Brook.
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The rest of the time TRICARE & Medicare take pretty good care of this ol 'retired codger.
Wounded Soldiers 2009
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The rest of the time TRICARE & Medicare take pretty good care of this ol 'retired codger.
Wounded Soldiers 2009
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Duvall returns as an elderly fellow in the 2010 Sundance flick "Get Low," a haunted codger pushing forward, again, simply because he's not yet underground.
Sundance Review: ‘Get Low’ Starring Bill Murray And Robert Duvall » MTV Movies Blog 2010
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The characters include a young African-American football player taking refuge from gang violence in his native Los Angeles, a 7-year-old boy on a strict regimen of medications for bipolar disorder, and a sage-like codger who scrapes together a living through illegal sales of cigarettes from a local Native American reservation.
A Delectable First Course of Foreign Films Steve Dollar 2011
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Whenever you hear some old codger bitching about how there's no one making good music anymore, tell him to shut up, put away his Woodstock records, and play this week's new releases.
Shawn Amos: PLAY > SKIP: This Week's New Music Shawn Amos 2011
yarb commented on the word codger
When I went into his chamber, a page had just brought him a basin of soup which he was taking. The dotard cherished his whiskers, or rather tortured them with curling-papers; though his eyes were sunk in their sockets, his complexion pale, and his visage emaciated. This was one of those old codgers who have been a little whimsical or so in their youth, and have made poor amends for their freedoms by the discretion of their riper age.
- Lesage, The Adventures of Gil Blas of Santillane, tr. Smollett, bk 4 ch. 7
September 18, 2008