to crap up
- phrasal verb
- /kræp ʌp/
- Offensive
- The heavy rain caused the drainage system to crap up with debris, leading to flooding on the roads.
Examples
-
The old pipes began to crap up over time, making it difficult for water to flow through.
-
If you don't clean the filter regularly, it will eventually crap up and reduce the machine's efficiency.
-
Because I took myself in that chair, crapping up my back, peeing blood in my leg, shin splint, stretch fractures.
Synonyms
To be unable to breathe because something blocks the throat or neck
To stop or slow something from happening
Become blocked so things cannot move
To block a pipe or passage so flow stops
To make something dirty or blocked so it does not work properly
To block a drain or road so things cannot move through it
Become blocked so things cannot move or work
To make moving parts stuck with dirt or glue so they stop working
To stop a supply by blocking its source or flow
To stop movement through a road, pipe, or path
Block a hole, pipe, or crack so nothing can pass through
To block a pipe or drain so water cannot pass through
To block or fill a place so things cannot move through it
Make things tangled or blocked so progress slows
Antonyms
How Blocked
Surface Forms
Morphology
The negative sense of 'crap' (worthless, to do something poorly) combined with the particle 'up' (indicating completion or a change of state) gives a plausible compositional reading 'make something crap / spoil something,' so a learner could partially infer the meaning. However, this usage is informal/slang and the specific sense 'ruin or spoil' is not a fully regular, cross-linguistic particle construction, so it is not reliably predictable for an average B1 learner without exposure.
Etymology
Crap up comes from the image of pipes or machines filling with crap and getting stuck up. So it means 'become blocked' or 'cause something to become blocked'.