adj. (colloquial).—Crotchetty; whimsical; rickety; not to be depended upon; crazy. [Cf., quot., 1787.]
ENGLISH SYNONYMS. Dicky; maggotty; dead-alive; yappy; touched; chumpish; comical; dotty; rocketty; queer; faddy; fadmongering; twisted; funny.
FRENCH SYNONYMS. Chevrotin (popular: applied to a bad or irritable temper); être comme un crin (popular); avoir sa chique (familiar: said of the temper).
1787. GROSE, A Provincial Glossary, etc. CRANKY, ailing, sickly; from the Dutch crank, sick.
1840. DICKENS, The Old Curiosity Shop, ch. vii., p. 33. Adding to this retort an observation to the effect that his friend appeared to be rather CRANKY in point of temper.
1863. C. READE, Hard Cash, II., 113. He had repeatedly been called in to cases of mania described as sudden, and almost invariably found the patient had been CRANKY for years.
1873. A. EDWARDS, A Vagabond Heroine, ch. xii. On goes the CRANKY carriage; on goes the swearing driver and the high-souled Burke.’
1874. E. WOOD, Johnny Ludlow, 1 S., No. III., p. 42. ‘What’s the matter now?’ asked Mrs. Hall, in her CRANKY way.
