ODDS AND ENDS • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Odds and ends

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/ɑdz ənd ɛndz/ Listen

noun

Odds n.

Difference in favor of one and against another; excess of one of two things or numbers over the other; inequality; advantage; superiority; hence, excess of chances; probability. The odds are often expressed by a ratio; as, the odds are three to one that he will win, i. e. he will win three times out of four "Preeminent by so much odds." "The fearful odds of that unequal fray." "The odds Is that we scarce are men and you are gods." "There appeared, at least, four to one odds against them." "All the odds between them has been the different scope... given to their understandings to range in." "Judging is balancing an account and determining on which side the odds lie."

Quarrel; dispute; debate; strife; chiefly in the phrase at odds. "Set them into confounding odds." "I can not speak Any beginning to this peevish odds."

At odds, in dispute; at variance. "These squires at odds did fall." "He flashes into one gross crime or other, that sets us all at odds."

It is odds, it is probable; same as odds are, but no longer used. (Obs.)

odds are it is probable; as, odds are he will win the gold medal.

Odds and ends, that which is left; remnants; fragments; refuse; scraps; miscellaneous articles. "My brain is filled... with all kinds of odds and ends."

slim odds low odds; poor chances; as, there are slim odds he will win any medal.

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Etymology of 'Odds and ends'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Odds and ends" Quotes from Famous Books

... Antanas with his mop slopping the "pickle" into a hole that connected with a sink, where it was caught and used over again forever; and if that were not enough, there was a trap in the pipe, where all the scraps of meat and odds and ends of refuse were caught, and every few days it was the old man's task to clean these out, and shovel their contents into one of the trucks with the rest of ...

— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair

... bar and link, and some of a bar, link, and ball. These different combinations may be separated out in the order named and placed in separate piles. After all these things have been removed, there is left in the original heap a number of odds and ends or miscellaneous ...

— The Classification of Patents • United States Patent Office

... in a musical and rational manner. The public are tired of hearing Potpourris, made up of odds and ends, tedious Etudes, Rhapsodies, Fantasias without fancy, dismal monotonies and endless, cheap, silly cadences that mean nothing. Learn to understand the age, and the world in ...

— Piano and Song - How to Teach, How to Learn, and How to Form a Judgment of - Musical Performances • Friedrich Wieck

... door silently behind her, and drew out her flashlight. The ray cut through the blackness. She was in what seemed like a small, outer storeroom, that was littered with an untidy collection of boxes, broken furniture, and odds and ends of all sorts. Ahead of her was an open door, and, through this, the flashlight disclosed the shop itself. She switched off the light now as she moved forward-there were the front windows, and, used too freely, the light might by some unlucky chance ...

— The White Moll • Frank L. Packard

... o'clock!" said Mrs. Hopkins. "You forget that this is Wednesday. We always keep the shop, except the post-office part, open until past nine on Wednesdays; such a lot of people come in for odds and ends on this special night. But I will be back long before nine. Don't on any account shut the ...

— The Rebel of the School • Mrs. L. T. Meade

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