muddle

From Middle Dutch moddelen (“to make muddy”), from Middle Dutch modde, mod (“mud”) (Modern Dutch modder). Compare German Kuddelmuddel.

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  Rhymes: -ʌdəl

muddle (third-person singular simple present muddles, present participle muddling, simple past and past participle muddled)

1. To mix together, to mix up; to confuse.

   Young children tend to muddle their words.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of F. W. Newman to this entry?)

2. To mash slightly for use in a cocktail.

   He muddled the mint sprigs in the bottom of the glass.

3. To dabble in mud.

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4. To make turbid or muddy.
   • L'Estrange

     He did ill to muddle the water.

5. To think and act in a confused, aimless way.
6. To cloud or stupefy; to render stupid with liquor; to intoxicate partially.
   • Bentley

     Their old master Epicurus seems to have had his brains so muddled and confounded with them, that he scarce ever kept in the right way.

   • Arbuthnot

     often drunk, always muddled

7. To waste or misuse, as one does who is stupid or intoxicated.
   • Hazlitt

     They muddle it [money] away without method or object, and without having anything to show for it.

muddle (plural muddles)

1. A mixture; a confusion; a garble.

   The muddle of nervous speech he uttered did not have much meaning.

2. (cooking and cocktails) A mixture of crushed ingredients, as prepared with a muddler.

• muddle-headed