1. [n]  a valve that controls the flow of air into the carburetor of a gasoline engine
2. [n]  a coil of low resistance and high inductance used in electrical circuits to pass direct current and attenuate alternating current
3. [v]  breathe with great difficulty, as when experiencing a strong emotion; "She choked with emotion when she spoke about her deceased husband"
4. [v]  cause to retch or choke
5. [v]  struggle for breath; have insufficient oxygen intake; "he swallowed a fishbone and gagged"
6. [v]  constrict (someone's) throat and keep from breathing
7. [v]  reduce the air supply; of carburetors
8. [v]  die (colloquial); "The old man finally kicked the bucket"
9. [v]  suppress the development, creativity, or imagination of; "His job suffocated him"
10. [v]  become stultified, suppressed, or stifled; "He is suffocating--living at home with his aged parents in the small village"
11. [v]  impair the respiration of or obstruct the air passage of; "The foul air was slowly suffocating the children"
12. [v]  become or cause to become obstructed; "The leaves clog our drains in the Fall"; "The water pipe is backed up"
13. [v]  be too tight; rub or press; "This neckband is choking the cat"
14. [v]  wring the neck of; "The man choked his opponent"
15. [v]  check or slow down the action or effect of; "She choked her anger"
16. [v]  fail to perform adequately due to tension or agitation; "The team should have won hands down but choked, disappointing the coach and the audience"

Choke
Former tennis professional Chuck Chandler has a reputation for choking on the big points and for his inability to keep his hands off his female tennis students. When the elderly, enigmatic husband of his current passion is found dead, Chuck is pursued by Detective Tommy Sculley and by a ruthless West Coast mob boss.

more details ...

1. \Choke\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Choked}; p. pr. & vb. n.
   {Choking}.] [OE. cheken, choken; cf. AS. [=a]ceocian to
   suffocate, Icel. koka to gulp, E. chincough, cough.]
   1. To render unable to breathe by filling, pressing upon, or
      squeezing the windpipe; to stifle; to suffocate; to
      strangle.
            With eager feeding food doth choke the feeder.
                                                  --Shak.
   2. To obstruct by filling up or clogging any passage; to
      block up. --Addison.
   3. To hinder or check, as growth, expansion, progress, etc.;
      to stifle.
            Oats and darnel choke the rising corn. --Dryden.
   4. To affect with a sense of strangulation by passion or
      strong feeling. ``I was choked at this word.'' --Swift.
   5. To make a choke, as in a cartridge, or in the bore of the
      barrel of a shotgun.
   {To choke off}, to stop a person in the execution of a
      purpose; as, to choke off a speaker by uproar.
   

2. \Choke\, v. i.
   1. To have the windpipe stopped; to have a spasm of the
      throat, caused by stoppage or irritation of the windpipe;
      to be strangled.
   2. To be checked, as if by choking; to stick.
            The words choked in his throat.       --Sir W.
                                                  Scott.
   

3. \Choke\, n.
   1. A stoppage or irritation of the windpipe, producing the
      feeling of strangulation.
   2. (Gun.)
      (a) The tied end of a cartridge.
      (b) A constriction in the bore of a shotgun, case of a
          rocket, etc.
   

1. To reject input, often ungracefully. "NULs make System V's "lpr(1)" choke." "I tried building an Emacs binary to use X, but "cpp(1)" choked on all those "#define"s." See barf, gag.

2. [MIT] More generally, to fail at any endeavor, but with some flair or bravado; the popular definition is "to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory."

[Jargon File]