up sticks
idiom
British, informal
: to pack up one's belongings and move to a different place
They upped sticks and left for London.
Examples of up sticks in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
As the world heats up, many species are expected to up sticks and meander many miles away from their typical habitat, bringing various pathogens along with them for the ride.
—
WIRED, 27 Oct. 2022
Pick up sticks or a guitar pick.
—Mitch Albom, Detroit Free Press, 15 May 2022
There are certainly times when physicality is needed around the net-front, but tying up sticks instead of trading crosschecks has become an effective way to defend in the front of the net.
—Matthew Defranks, Dallas News, 8 Sep. 2021
As a consequence, according to Joe Carlasare, a bitcoin advocate and partner at law firm SmithAmundsen LLC, some developers in the DeFi space might simply up sticks and leave America altogether.
—Wired, 17 Aug. 2021
Mehring didn’t pick up sticks again until the pandemic took social gatherings off the table.
—René A. Guzman, San Antonio Express-News, 27 Apr. 2021
Some workers surely feared that unionizing would prompt Amazon to up sticks.
—Stephen Collinson, CNN, 12 Apr. 2021
Another part of its mission is to be the first step in a complicated robotic game of pick up sticks that will eventually bring some of the rocks back to Earth for scientists to study up close.
—Kenneth Chang, New York Times, 18 Feb. 2021
Growth and opportunity at home, the thinking went, would dull people’s enthusiasm to up sticks.
—The Economist, 29 Aug. 2020
WIRED, 27 Oct. 2022
Pick up sticks or a guitar pick.
—Mitch Albom, Detroit Free Press, 15 May 2022
There are certainly times when physicality is needed around the net-front, but tying up sticks instead of trading crosschecks has become an effective way to defend in the front of the net.
—Matthew Defranks, Dallas News, 8 Sep. 2021
As a consequence, according to Joe Carlasare, a bitcoin advocate and partner at law firm SmithAmundsen LLC, some developers in the DeFi space might simply up sticks and leave America altogether.
—Wired, 17 Aug. 2021
Mehring didn’t pick up sticks again until the pandemic took social gatherings off the table.
—René A. Guzman, San Antonio Express-News, 27 Apr. 2021
Some workers surely feared that unionizing would prompt Amazon to up sticks.
—Stephen Collinson, CNN, 12 Apr. 2021
Another part of its mission is to be the first step in a complicated robotic game of pick up sticks that will eventually bring some of the rocks back to Earth for scientists to study up close.
—Kenneth Chang, New York Times, 18 Feb. 2021
Growth and opportunity at home, the thinking went, would dull people’s enthusiasm to up sticks.
—The Economist, 29 Aug. 2020
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'up sticks.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
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Cite this Entry
“Up sticks.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/up%20sticks. Accessed 1 May. 2024.
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