umpteen times
1
6.3
- noun
- Informal
:
un sinfín de veces
- But as has been repeated umpteen times before, autism is a disease of developmental delay, not developmental stasis; time alone helps.
Examples
-
The conversations she'd heard father and son having umpteen times and thought were just one-sided.
Fiction book (2002) -
We're not going down the same corridor umpteen times.
-
She's checked on me like umpteen times since this whole thing happened, so...
-
Yet the guy who railed about government workers with guns and badges curtailing liberty umpteen times in the very same post could not realize the implications of that defense.
Blog text (19) -
I've had this discussion umpteen times with my friends, but they still don't understand.
-
She has called me umpteen times to check if I'm feeling better after my illness.
-
We've gone over the project details umpteen times, yet there are still mistakes.
Synonyms
382
1.0
It happens again and again
268
1.0
Happens many times
73
1.8
Very often on many occasions
47
1.8
Happens again and again
Antonyms
How Often
- Informal
6
2.0
- Informal
1
6.3
6
2.6
30
2.5
∞
1.0
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'a large but indefinite number of times' is directly derivable from combining 'umpteen' (an indefinite large number) with 'times' (occurrences), following the common numeral/adjective + count-noun pattern. Although 'umpteen' is informal, its semantics are transparent and cross-linguistically analogous, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents will readily understand the expression.
Etymology
Umpteen times began as a playful, made-up number: people added -teen to a nonsense word like ump to suggest a number too large to bother counting. So umpteen times means 'very many times' or 'so many times you lose count'.