or rocked, rocketty, adj. (common).—1. Broken: by drink, illness, poverty; and (2) difficult; dubious; debateable. Hence TO GO ROCKY = to go to pieces; to go wrong. Whence ROCKINESS = (1) craziness; (2) incapacity, utter or partial; OFF ONE’S ROCKER = crazy; ROCKED IN A STONE KITCHEN = ‘the person spoken of is a fool, his brains having been disordered by the jumbling of his cradle’ (GROSE).
1885. Daily Telegraph, 28 Dec. Let him keep the fact of things having gone ROCKY with him as dark as he can.
1892. National Observer, 20 Feb., 352, 1. Though the morals were ROCKY … the society was very good.
1896. CRANE, Maggie, a Girl of the Streets, xiv. I call it ROCKY treatment for a fellah like me.
1897. The Sporting Times, 13 March, 1, 2. It dawned upon the crowd that he was a bit ROCKY in his aspirates.
