swing the lead
verb1
To avoid work, especially by pretending to be ill; to shirk, to malinger.
- Though he was by no means inclined to help carry a gas-cylinder on a pole, while watching the working party fall in on the road that night, Bourne felt rather out of it; he felt as though he were swinging the lead.1929, Frederic Manning, The Middle Parts of Fortune, Vintage, published 2014, page 93:
- I said, ‘Well, how d'you like having to do some work for a change, instead of swinging the lead at Fort Hommet?’1974, GB Edwards, The Book of Ebenezer Le Page, New York, published 2007, page 129:
- Related terms
- dodge the column