BY Led Black (@Led_Black)
Loosie [pronounced Lu-See] – noun
A loosie is a single cigarette that can be purchased illegally in some of the bodegas and smoke shops of NYC but be warned, if the proprietor of the business doesn’t know you or you look like a D.T. (undercover cop), you will not be able to obtain said loosie.
For the most part, a loosie is synonymous with Newports but a few of the smoke shops also offer Marlboros. Back in the day, when I was a kid coming up, loosies were 10 cents. Now that a pack of cigarettes are like a hundred dollars, the price of a loosie hovers around the ungodly sum of a dollar. Some enterprising individuals are buying packs and selling loosies themselves, just to support their habit and make some money on the side. This streak of street entrepreneurship can you get killed if you are a person of color. Need I mention Eric Garner (Rest In Peace).
Another term that is affiliated with a loosie is a bust down. The bust down is when you give someone else the remainder of your cigarette. The way it works is that as soon as someone you know sees you with a loosie, they will shout out – ” let me get a bust down”. But, now that a loosie is so expensive, folks are much more reluctant to give bust downs. In fact, people are actually smoking their loosies all the way down to Brownsville, which is the very end of the loosie where the tobacco meets the filter.
Related Words: Loose, Stogie, Cancer Stick
Loosie in a Sentence:
A young man walks into a smoke shop after a long day of work and shouts at the Arab man behind the counter, “Yo Habib, let me get a loosie.”
Also in Word!: El Pale
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