flat-out

Adjective

flat out (not comparable)

1. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see flat, out.
   • So many of them took pictures, of themselves and of me, that we ran flat out of black-and-white film the second day out, and there wasn′t a Queen Mary necktie to be had in the shops after we left the port.1967 October 6, Dora Jane Hamblin, “Out to Sea and into History”, in LIFE, page 29
2. Complete, total, downright.
   • Avoid Flat-Out Opposites
     The slob vs. the neatnik. The artist vs. the precision-freak. The freethinker vs. the tightass. Liberal vs. conservative. Jock vs. nerd. David vs. Goliath. Good vs. evil. Beauty and the Beast. Jekyll^([sic]) and Hyde.2003, Thomas B. Sawyer, Fiction Writing Demystified, page 63
3. Very busy.
   • I know we are all flat out. That is the way it is. We are flat out, and it becomes a way of life.2006, Gideon Kunda, Engineering Culture: Control and Commitment in a High-Tech Corporation, page 203
4. (Australia) Lazy, sleeping.
   • flat out (like a lizard in the sun) - doing absolutely nothing

See all 13 meanings of flat out