All 50 Uses of
minute
in
Catch-22
- There was something fearful and minute about Doc Daneeka as he sat despondently outside his tent in the sunlight as often as he could, dressed in khaki summer trousers and a short-sleeved summer shirt that was bleached almost to an antiseptic gray by the daily laundering to which he had it subjected.
Chpt 4 (definition 1)minute = small
- As he sat inertly at the rickety bridge table that served as a desk, his lips were closed, his eyes were blank, and his face, with its pale ochre hue and ancient, confined clusters of minute acne pits, had the color and texture of an uncracked almond shell.
Chpt 20 (definition 1) *
- 'I won't take the valve apart now,' he said, and began taking it apart, working with slow, tireless, interminable precision, his rustic, ungainly face bent very close to the floor, picking painstakingly at the minute mechanism in his fingers with such limitless, plodding concentration that he seemed scarcely to be thinking of it at all.
Chpt 28 (definition 1)
Uses with a very common or rare meaning:
- In about fifteen minutes the crash trucks from the airfield arrived to fight the fire.†
Chpt 1 (definition 2)
- The argument with Clevinger had begun a few minutes earlier when Yossarian had been unable to find a machine gun.†
Chpt 2 (definition 2)
- A minute passed.†
Chpt 3 (definition 2)
- It was still impossible to imagine what he could have done to make her angry enough to hammer him over the head for fifteen or twenty minutes, yet not angry enough to pick him up by the ankles and dash his brains out.†
Chpt 3 (definition 2)
- Dunbar loved shooting skeet because he hated every minute of it and the time passed so slowly.†
Chpt 4 (definition 2)
- A half minute before that you were stepping into high school, and an unhooked brassiere was as close as you ever hoped to get to Paradise.†
Chpt 4 (definition 2)
- The officers of the other five planes in each flight arrived in trucks for the general briefing that took place thirty minutes later.†
Chpt 5 (definition 2)
- A chubby, moon-faced navigator with little reptilian eyes and a pipe like Aarfy's had trouble, too, and Yossarian used to chase him back from the nose as they turned toward the target, now minutes away.†
Chpt 5 (definition 2)
- It took almost a full minute for Appleby to disentangle himself from Orr's flailing arms and legs and grope his way to his feet, with Orr held off the ground before him by the shirt front in one hand and his other arm drawn back in a fist to smite him dead, and at that moment Yossarian stepped forward and took Orr away from him.†
Chpt 6 (definition 2)
- You're going to learn, Popinjay — the minute we finish with Clevinger you're going to learn.†
Chpt 8 (definition 2)
- A punishment tour for Clevinger was fifty minutes of a weekend hour spent pacing back and forth before the provost marshal's building with a ton of an unloaded rifle on his shoulder.†
Chpt 8 (definition 2)
- The recruits in his squadron had all been shaken roughly awake only minutes before by the sergeant's corporals and told to assemble in front of the administration tent.†
Chpt 9 (definition 2)
- Minutes passed in rigid silence, and the whole lot of them might have stood there at attention till doomsday if Major Danby had not dropped by from Group to congratulate Major Major twenty minutes later and put them all at ease.†
Chpt 9 (definition 2)
- Minutes passed in rigid silence, and the whole lot of them might have stood there at attention till doomsday if Major Danby had not dropped by from Group to congratulate Major Major twenty minutes later and put them all at ease.†
Chpt 9 (definition 2)
- In the space of a single productive minute, therefore, he might endorse twenty separate documents each advising him to pay absolutely no attention to any of the others.†
Chpt 9 (definition 2)
- Now, you keep your eyes open and let me know the minute you hear anyone even talking about Washington Irving.†
Chpt 9 (definition 2)
- A minute later, the flap separating Major Major's office from the orderly room flew open and the second C.I.D. man was back, puffing frantically in haste.†
Chpt 9 (definition 2)
- Give me a minute or two to put some mercurochrome on these cuts.†
Chpt 9 (definition 2)
- I've still got a lot to get done today so that I can be fully prepared bright and early tomorrow morning to go into combat the minute they want me to.'†
Chpt 10 (definition 2)
- Bologna should have exulted Dunbar, because the minutes dawdled and the hours dragged like centuries.†
Chpt 10 (definition 2)
- But what's the point of the rest of us working so hard if you're going to give Major Major medical attention the minute Milo begins starving him to death?†
Chpt 11 (definition 2)
- I'll have Milo speak to him about it the minute he gets back from Rome.'†
Chpt 11 (definition 2)
- After a minute, Yossarian and a gentle warm wind were the only things stirring in the haunting tranquillity that hung like a drug over the vacated tents.†
Chpt 14 (definition 2)
- You'll tear it up into little pieces the minute I'm gone and go walking away like a big shot because a tall, young, beautiful girl like me, Luciana, let you sleep with her and did not ask you for money.†
Chpt 16 (definition 2)
- The minute she was gone, Yossarian tore the slip of paper up and walked away in the other direction, feeling very much like a big shot because a beautiful young girl like Luciana had slept with him and did not ask for money.†
Chpt 16 (definition 2)
- If I had gotten syphilis or a dose of clap for my five minutes of passion on the beach instead of this damned mosquito bite, I could see justice.†
Chpt 17 (definition 2)
- You let them come in and look you over for a few minutes and I won't tell anyone you've been lying about your liver symptoms.'†
Chpt 18 (definition 2)
- All you've got to do is lie there a few minutes and die a little.†
Chpt 18 (definition 2)
- If it's just for a few minutes and you promise to wait right outside.†
Chpt 18 (definition 2)
- We'll allocate about a minute and a half for you in the schedule.†
Chpt 19 (definition 2)
- Will a minute and a half be enough?†
Chpt 19 (definition 2)
- The tomato you're still holding in your hand right this very minute!'†
Chpt 20 (definition 2)
- 'I think you'd better wait a minute, Dad,' he suggested hesitantly.†
Chpt 21 (definition 2)
- You'll see how much profit that can mean in about fifteen minutes when we land in Palermo.'†
Chpt 22 (definition 2)
- There's an endive exporter in Palermo I have to see for a minute about a shipment of mushrooms to Bern that were damaged by mold.†
Chpt 22 (definition 2)
- 'They're ripening very quickly,' answered Milo, 'and we don't have a minute to lose.†
Chpt 22 (definition 2)
- Luckily, Hungry Joe burst in just then, and everything was all right again, except that Dunbar staggered in drunk a minute later and began embracing one of the other giggling girls at once.†
Chpt 23 (definition 2)
- One more girl appeared wearing only panties and sat down, bringing the total congregating there in just a few minutes to eleven, all but one of them completely unclothed.†
Chpt 23 (definition 2)
- Now, you go right back there this minute and try it again.†
Chpt 24 (definition 2)
- Ten minutes passed.†
Chpt 25 (definition 2) *
- Minutes passed like hours before he finally recognized himself as the source of the turbulent roar that was overwhelming him.†
Chpt 25 (definition 2)
- He prayed that Corporal Whitcomb would be gone when he reached the clearing so that he could undress without embarrassment, wash his arms and chest and shoulders thoroughly, drink water, lie down refreshed and perhaps even sleep for a few minutes; but he was in for still another disappointment and still another shock, for Corporal Whitcomb was Sergeant Whitcomb by the time he arrived and was sitting with his shirt off in the chaplain's chair sewing his new sergeant's stripes on his…†
Chpt 25 (definition 2)
- And I am going to do something about it, this very minute.†
Chpt 25 (definition 2)
- Watching him was all that kept us from going to pieces altogether during the first few minutes, what with each wave washing over us into the raft or dumping a few of us back into the water so that we had to climb back in again before the next wave came along and washed us right back out.†
Chpt 28 (definition 2)
- And that's how he spent the time until the launch picked us up about thirty minutes later, sitting there with that baited fishing line out behind him, with the compass in his lap and the map spread out on his knees, and paddling away as hard as he could with that dinky blue oar as though he was speeding to Majorca.†
Chpt 28 (definition 2)
- The valve Orr was dismantling was about the size of a thumb and contained thirty-seven separate parts, excluding the casing, many of them so minute that Orr was required to pinch them tightly between the tips of his fingernails as he placed them carefully on the floor in orderly, catalogued rows, never quickening his movements or slowing them down, never tiring, never pausing in his relentless, methodical, monotonous procedure unless it was to leer at Yossarian with maniacal mischief.†
Chpt 28 (definition 2)
- I bet he'll show up any minute.'†
Chpt 28 (definition 2)
Definitions:
-
(1) (minute as in: minute size) small, exceptionally small, or insignificant
-
(2) (meaning too common or rare to warrant focus) Much more commonly, minute and minutes refer to a period of time lasting 60 seconds.
Less commonly, they refer to a measurement of angle where 60 minutes make up a single degree, and where a right angle has 90 degrees and a circle has 360 degrees.