Meaning

(informal) A drink, often an alcoholic one, taken as a stimulant or sometimes as a hangover cure; a restorative, tonic or bracer..

Definitions by Sense

1. (informal) A drink, often an alcoholic one, taken as a stimulant or sometimes as a hangover cure; a restorative, tonic or bracer.
2. Something that improves one's mood.

Example Sentences

Strong tea is just the pick-me-up that I need right now.

He brought a hip flask along, just in case he needs a little pick-me-up later.

Adonis calls for a ‘pick-me-up’ before he has strength enough to answer a billet-doux from Venus. Adonis has not the strength to get nobly drunk, but his delicate constitution requires stimulants, and he is always tippling.

Make half-a-pint of beef-tea in a tumbler with this extract. Put the tumbler in a refrigerator for an hour, then add a liqueur-glassful of old brandy, with just a dust of cayenne. This is one of the very best pick-me-ups known to the faculty.

"I'm feeling fine today," pursued Gideon, advancing a step and so bringing himself about halfway to the table. "Had a couple of pick-me-ups and a fat breakfast. How are you?"

In fact I did not feel good. I was suffering from the morning sickness of the steady, heavy drinker. What I needed was a pick-me-up, a bracer.

I have had occasion, I fancy, to speak before now of these pick-me-ups of Jeeves’s and their effect on a fellow who is hanging to life by a thread on the morning after. What they consist of, I couldn’t tell you. He says some kind of sauce, the yolk of a raw egg and a dash of red pepper, but nothing will convince me that the thing doesn’t go much deeper than that.

God, he needed a drink. Just a little pick-me-up to put things in their true perspective— […]

Word Forms

• pick-me-ups

Synonyms for pick-me-up

Related Words

When Should You Use Pick-me-up?

Use pick-me-up when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.

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