slap-dab, adv. N. Amer. dial. and colloq.
[f. slap adv. + dab adv.]
= slap-bang adv. (see also quot. 1896). Cf. smack-dab adv.
| 1886 Turf, Field & Farm XLII. 174/3 He was goin' that fas' he run slap-dab agin me afo' he seed me. 1896 Dialect Notes I. 399 Slap-dab.., violently or awkwardly. ‘He rushed in slap-dab and broke things.’ 1949 Publ. Amer. Dial. Soc. xi. 11 It jumped slap-dab in the middle. 1973 Victorian (Victoria, B.C.) 1 Aug. 1/1 It occurred slap dab in the middle of what is now Centennial Square. |