Nip and tuck

[ratammer]

Until today, the only meaning I knew for the phrase "nip and tuck" was that it was slang for plastic surgery. Then today I was researching something and learned from Wiktionary that it can also mean "evenly matched", like in a competition where it's very close between two contestants. By complete coincidence, less than an hour later, I heard it used in that exact way on a game show. The universe is playing tricks on me.

So I asked around on some Discord servers what that phrase meant to them. I got a couple of people saying the same two meanings as above, but I got some other answers too: one person said to them it means "fastidiously neat/cleaned up", which was very interesting because it perfectly fit the context that was why I was looking up the meaning in the first place. Someone else offered that it means a quick fix (I suppose that matches the plastic surgery meaning), or to hide alcohol.

Anyone else familiar with these alternative meanings? Or have any more of your own?

[foxcatdog]

This phrase is completely new to me, but nip reminds me of nipple as in nipple surgery (and of course nip) and tuck seems like a surgical action so i guess it would mean something related to plastic surgery.

[fusijui]

I learned it in the context of household chores -- specifically making up beds, but my memory may be less reliable on that part.

[Estav]

I don't use it or hear it. I first encountered the combination in the name of the medical drama TV series Nip/Tuck (2003-2010): presumably, its title was meant to be a play on words. I wonder whether "nip and tuck" was ever used as slang for "plastic surgery" before that: it seems possible, perhaps probable to me that it wasn't.

[fusijui]

It's been used to refer to plastic surgery since at least the 1970s (personal experience) and I've read it in novels from the mid or late 1950s. I'd thought it had fallen out of use somewhat in the 90s, actually -- maybe that's why it could seem novel again, for some?

[Raphael]

I'd thought it had fallen out of use somewhat in the 90s, actually -- maybe that's why it could seem novel again, for some?

Yes, that might be it.