lifer

Noun

lifer (plural lifers)

1. A prisoner sentenced to life in prison.
2. A prisoner sentenced to transportation for life.
   • They know what a clever lad he is; he'll be a lifer. They'll make the Artful nothing less than a lifer.1838, Boz [pseudonym; Charles Dickens], Oliver Twist; […], volume (please specify |volume=I, II, or III), London: Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC
3. A person with a singular career path, especially in the military.
   • "[…]The Top's not a lifer; he's a career Marine. Lifers are a breed. A lifer is anybody who abuses authority he doesn't deserve to have. There are plenty of civilian lifers."1979, Gustav Hasford, The Short-Timers, New York: Bantam Books, published 1980, →ISBN, page 63
   • LRRP planned to become “career” Army, i.e., a lifer, you kept that quiet. Basic LRRP theology said the Army sucked and that philosophy kept one from going crazy because, at the bottom, nothing about the war seemed to make sense anyway. The LRRP's considered a lifer a loser. Being a lifer implied...2002, Paul Newman, Nine From The Ninth, iUniverse, →ISBN, page 17
4. A species seen for the first time by a birder or other naturalist who is keeping a list of all the species they have seen.
   • It is difficult to classify them precisely, but, in roughly ascending order of productivity, we now recognise the purely chance observer, the locality regulars (now recognising that ‘time in’ eventually equals ‘rarity out’), the ringers (particularly when working in groups), the occasional...1970, D.I.M. Wallace, “The first ten years of the Rarities Committee”, in British Birds, volume 63, number 3, London, page 124
   • We have concurred that it was clearly Problema byssus, the byssus skipper: a lifer for me.2010, Robert Michael Pyle, Mariposa Road: The First Butterfly Big Year, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, →ISBN

   Synonyms:

   life bird