Faffing About Means Dawdling, Procrastinating, or Acting Ineffectually

Hi, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Chris from Hollywood, Florida.

Hi, Chris. Welcome.

Hi, Chris. What can we do for you?

I went to Europe for the first time in 2021, November, went to Spain.

On my way back, I stopped in London.

I had a pint with a friend. He suggests we go see another friend.

And as we’re riding around in the city that night, they’re showing me around.

They use this word fauf f-a-f-f and I’ve loved the word ever since I’ve looked it up a few times and kind of have gotten some context and some history but I feel like I still have no idea what I’m talking about. Still use it all the time but you know would love some more faffing. F-A-F-F. Frank Adam Frank Frank.

-huh.

And how would you hear it used?

Yeah, what did you take it to mean?

When he used it, it kind of felt like a bit of maybe procrastination, dilly-dallying in a sense, or wasting time.

Perfect.

So that’s kind of how these do.

That’s it.

Exactly right.

That’s what faffing or faffing about is exactly what it is.

It’s dawdling, wasting time, dithering, having no purpose or point, or even acting ineffectually.

Okay, cool.

It rose to prominence in British English during the 1980s with shows like Coronation Street, which is kind of a soap opera.

But ultimately, it comes from a pair of English dialect words in places like Yorkshire.

And faff could be used to describe wind or plants blowing in the wind.

A faffing wind was a gusty wind, or faffing wheat was swaying wheat, or you faff the chaff of grain in your hands.

And before long, you can see in the written record that faff came into figurative use to include, I guess, your breath.

You know, kind of wasting your breath or wasting your time or energy or making it faster to gossip.

Just these little gusts of energy or breath that seem to have no point or purpose.

Yeah, doing something insubstantial.

Yeah, something insubstantial.

And I love the form faffment, F-A-F-F-M-E-N-T, which means nonsense or balderdash.

A load of faffment.

Enough with this faffment.

But there’s another word faffle too, which is possibly related.

Faffle is a verb, which originally meant to stutter, but came to mean to work in a slow, delaying, or obstructing way, or to saunter, or to fumble.

And that possibly has some reinforcing effect on to faff.

And it also spawned the word fafflement, meaning trifling or unnecessary work.

So I guess you could, if there’s something you do not want to do and want no part of, you could call it fafflement and fafflement.

Wow.

That would be a great name for a law firm, fafflement and fafflement.

Well, Chris, we’re delighted that you would call and faff about with us for a bit.

Yeah.

It’s my pleasure and honor to learn about it with you guys.

And, you know, I’ve come to find that sometimes it will be faff.

Yeah.

Life is full of fafflement.

Fafflement and bafflement.

Thanks for calling, Chris.

Take care.

It’s my pleasure, guys.

Have a great one.

All right.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

If you want to faff about with us, give us a call, 877-929-9673.