odd or even

or odds or evens

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noun

any of various games of chance in which one bets on an odd or even number, as one in which two players alternately draw from a pile of an odd number of counters any desired number up to a prearranged limit, the object being to have drawn an odd number of counters at the end of the game.

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The rainy weather could not ________ my elated spirits on my graduation day.

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effect

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Also odd and even .

Origin of odd or even

First recorded in 1625–35

Words nearby odd or even

odd-lotter, odd-man, odd man out, odd-man rush, oddment, odd or even, odd permutation, odd-pinnate, odds, odds and ends, odds and sods

How to use odd or even in a sentence

One concerns the “parity” of a graph’s vertices, meaning whether they are connected to an odd or even number of other vertices.
Mathematicians Answer Old Question About Odd Graphs|Kevin Hartnett|May 19, 2021|Quanta Magazine
Lines for gas formed, and service stations rationed supplies, sometimes using a system in which they fueled cars on alternate days depending on whether license plates ended in odd or even numbers.
Run on gas leaves some drivers with empty tanks|Fredrick Kunkle|May 13, 2021|Washington Post
Alcohol and sugar, even in moderate amounts, are not only sinful but poisonous.
How Taryn Toomey’s ‘The Class’ Became New York’s Latest Fitness Craze|Lizzie Crocker|January 9, 2015|DAILY BEAST
This is even more striking in Submission than in his previous books.
Houellebecq’s Incendiary Novel Imagines France With a Muslim President|Pierre Assouline|January 9, 2015|DAILY BEAST

As this list shows, punishments typically run to a short-ish jail sentence and/or a moderately hefty fine.
In Defense of Blasphemy|Michael Tomasky|January 9, 2015|DAILY BEAST
Even internally in the House, women are not getting their fair shake.
The Unbearable Whiteness of Congress|Dean Obeidallah|January 8, 2015|DAILY BEAST
Weiss is likely to get confirmed even as Warren and a handful of other progressive Democrats vote no.
Sen. Warren’s Main Street Crusade to Pressure Clinton|Eleanor Clift|January 8, 2015|DAILY BEAST
Some were even re-arrested for the same nefarious purpose, and the daily papers published their names on each occasion.
The Philippine Islands|John Foreman
Even as they gazed they saw its roof caught up, and whirled off as if it had been a scroll of paper.
The Giant of the North|R.M. Ballantyne
I presume the twenty-five or thirty miles at this end is unhealthy, even for natives, but it surely need not be so.
Glances at Europe|Horace Greeley
Genoa has but recently and partially felt the new impulse, yet even here the march of improvement is visible.
Glances at Europe|Horace Greeley
He was the strangest-looking creature Davy had ever seen, not even excepting the Goblin.
Davy and The Goblin|Charles E. Carryl