mucky pup
- noun
- Baby Talk
:
pequeño sucio
- My little brother is such a mucky pup after playing outside.
Examples
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Don't let the mucky pup jump on the sofa while he's still wet!
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Grandma shook her head and called me a mucky pup when she saw my muddy boots.
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Sophie returned home after football practice looking like a real mucky pup.
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Look at that mucky pup covered in mud!
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Look at you, you little mucky pup; you've gotten mud all over your clothes!
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After playing outside all day, he returned home a tired, happy mucky pup covered in dirt.
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The dog looked like a mucky pup after rolling in the grass and dirt.
Synonyms
A child who is very dirty after playing outside
Antonyms
How Dirty
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning is directly compositional: 'mucky' (messy/covered in mud) modifies 'pup' (young dog), giving the clear sense of a dirty/untidy young animal; the affectionate use for a child is a predictable diminutive/term-of-endearment extension. This straightforward adjective+noun combination follows common cross-linguistic patterns, so a B1 learner who knows both words will readily infer the MWE's meaning.
Etymology
Mucky pup comes from the picture of a small dog covered in mud, where mucky means 'dirty' and pup means a young dog. People use it kindly for children or dogs who look 'dirty' or 'messy' because a muddy puppy looks cute rather than bad.