be the worse for drink

be the worse for drink

1. To be drunk.
   • 1950 January, David L. Smith, “A Runaway at Beattock”, in Railway Magazine, page 53:

     Driver James Mitchell was the worse for drink. When he took duty at Carlisle on the previous evening, he was smelling of whisky; there were signs of drink on him at Beattock, and when they left Carstairs on the return journey, he was worse.

• “the worse for drink”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• “the worse for drink”, in Cambridge English Dictionary, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, 1999–present.