cuss out

cuss out (third-person singular simple present cusses out, present participle cussing out, simple past and past participle cussed out)

1. (chiefly US, informal, transitive) To berate (someone or something) using profane language; to swear at (someone or something), especially at length.
   • 1969 Jan. 3, "Tennis: That Special Feeling," Time (retrieved 19 April 2014):

     [A]fter winning a berth on the U.S. Davis Cup team, he was dropped from the competition for the ungentlemanly way in which he cussed out a ball boy.

   • 1972, Stuart Hunter Palmer, The Violent Society, →ISBN, p. 46 (Google preview):

     "[H]e was cussing me out just like he had before. Calling me every filthy name in the book."

   • 2014 April 16, Diane E Coston, "MDOT Addressing Pot Hole Myth with RealityCheck," WHTC.com (retrieved 19 April 2014):

     When you’re traveling Michigan roads and cussing out the potholes, MDOT wants you to know that THEY know that pothole patches don’t last.

• Sometimes out is placed before the object of this verb and sometimes it is placed after the object.

• curse out

• cuss out at OneLook Dictionary Search