loaf
nounverbverbattested in dialogue
- United Kingdom//ləʊf//
- United States//loʊf//
A block of bread after baking.
noun
- 1
A block of bread after baking.
Philander went into the next room[…]and came back with a salt mackerel that dripped brine like a rainstorm. Then he put the coffee pot on the stove and rummaged out a loaf of dry bread and some hardtack.
- 2
Any solid block of food, such as meat or sugar.
sugar-loaf
- 3
A solid block of soap, from which standard bar soap is cut.
- 4
A particular still life configuration with seven living cells.
It runs for 17331 generations before stabilizing as 136 blinkers, 109 blocks, 65 beehives, 18 loaves, 18 boats, 7 ships, 4 tubs, 3 ponds, 2 toads, and 40 gliders.
Running a LWSS into it can produce various debris. One of these reactions produces a loaf. When the loaf is properly hit with other LWSSs, it can be pulled backwards.
I am looking for the smallest ancestor of the following four loaf pattern in Conway's Game of Life:
- 5
informalA catloaf.
- 6
Variant of loaf of breadslangEllipsis of loaf of bread: the brain or the head.
use one's loaf
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *kʷel-der.? Proto-Germanic *hlaibaz Proto-West Germanic *hlaib Old English hlāf Middle English lof English loaf * From Middle English laf, lof, loof, from Old English hlāf (“bread; loaf”), from Proto-West Germanic *hlaib, from Proto-Germanic *hlaibaz (“bread; loaf”), of uncertain origin. Perhaps related to Old English hlifian (“to stand out prominently, tower up”). Cognates Cognate with German Laib (“loaf”), Danish and Swedish lev (“loaf”), Faroese leivur (“an oblong bun”), Icelandic hleifur (“loaf”), Norwegian Nynorsk leiv (“loaf”), Gothic 𐌷𐌻𐌰𐌹𐌱𐍃 (hlaibs), 𐌷𐌻𐌰𐌹𐍆𐍃 (hlaifs, “bread”) (whence Proto-Slavic *xlěbъ (“bread”) (see there for further descendants)), Estonian leib (“black bread”), Finnish leipä (“bread; loaf”); also Latvian klaips (“loaf”), Lithuanian kliẽpas (“loaf”). Doublet of chleb and khleb. * (brain or head): Rhyming slang, ellipsis of loaf of bread.
verb
- 1
slangTo headbutt
verb
- 1
To do nothing, to be idle.
loaf about, loaf around
2015, Elizabeth Royte, Vultures Are Revolting. Here’s Why We Need to Save Them., National Geographic (December 2015)https://web.archive.org/web/20151213095110/http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2016/01/vultures-text They don’t (often) kill other animals, they probably form monogamous pairs, and we know they share parental care of chicks, and loaf and bathe in large, congenial groups.
Etymology
Probably a back-formation from loafer.
Forms
- plural
- loaves
- past tense
- loafed
- past participle
- loafed
- present participle
- loafing
- third person singular
- loafs