Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- intransitive verb To waste time; trifle.
- intransitive verb To talk nonsense.
- noun Nonsense; foolishness.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb To waste time; to
trifle . - verb To talk
nonsense . - noun
nonsense ;foolishness .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- verb act foolishly, as by talking nonsense
- verb be about
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Support
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Examples
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"footle," in the business of advertising he developed a curious literary twist.
Hocken and Hunken Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch 1903
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This is not a major refit, just an up-gun of GURPS Horror, 3rd Ed. to the GURPS 4E rules, but I have been granted 16 or so more pages to footle around in.
Kenneth Hite's Journal princeofcairo 2008
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'If you sit down and listen in any moderately lucid state of mind the impression you have is of an old man muttering and ranting on in the aural foreground, while some young lads, engaged on some completely unrelated project, footle around with the controls on a mixing desk in the next room'
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Permission to footle in the lab. on half-holidays, and all the rest of it?
Acton's Feud A Public School Story Frederick Swainson
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"I suppose you'll just footle, then," his friend had summed it up, and left him, because it was half-past six, and they had dinner at that strange hour.
The Lee Shore Rose Macaulay 1919
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(I'm calling it footle, Ponderevo, out of praise, "he said in parenthesis.)" Think of the little clerks and jaded women and overworked people.
Tono Bungay 1906
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I can't stand his 'Theatre' -- that's footle -- but the big things -- 'Le Pere Goriot,' 'La Cousine Bette,'
The Fortunate Youth William John Locke 1896
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For the last fourteen years the bulk of policy debate has been not about how we address the organic issues facing an economy and society like that of the UK, but how we footle around at the edges of it, creating projects that may, tangentially, affect someone somewhere, but in all probability not.
Arts & Ecology blog 2008
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For the last fourteen years the bulk of policy debate has been not about how we address the organic issues facing an economy and society like that of the UK, but how we footle around at the edges of it, creating projects that may, tangentially, affect someone somewhere, but in all probability not.
Arts & Ecology blog 2008
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Not only that, but the sort of things he would say in his sleep would be things like, "The opening up of trade routes to the mumble mumble burble was the turning point for the growth of empire in the snore footle mumble.
Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency Adams, Douglas, 1952-2001 1987
hernesheir commented on the word footle
Oh, hello everybody.
March 11, 2016
bilby commented on the word footle
*wavles*
March 11, 2016