A short burst of doing one thing a lot, more than is sensible, and usually enjoying it at the time. The classic ones are a shopping spree (you go out and buy far too much in one afternoon) and a drinking spree. The word carries no shame while it is happening — it sounds fun, a little wild, a bit out of control, and it always ends. That is the key: a spree has a start and a stop. If you shop too much every week, that is a habit, not a spree. Note that it usually comes after another word telling you what the spree is made of: shopping spree, spending spree, drinking spree, crime spree, killing spree. The light, playful feeling belongs to the shopping and drinking ones; when you attach it to something terrible — a crime spree, a shooting spree — the word keeps only its "one after another, in a short time" part and the fun disappears completely. English does this a lot: the same word, but the company it keeps decides the mood. You can also say "go on a spree" by itself, and people will usually assume spending or drinking. Where the word came from is genuinely uncertain — dictionaries offer several guesses (a French word for lively wit, an Irish word, an old Scots word for a cattle raid) and do not agree, so honestly nobody knows.