faff
/fæf/ (bre, ipa) · /fæf/ (ame, ipa)
faff — 動詞
- faffpresent simple I / you / we / they
- faffshe / she / it
- faffedpast simple
- faffing-ing form
1. to busy yourself in a disorganized way with small jobs, getting little real work
瞎忙；窮折騰
雜事亂忙卻沒進展
to busy yourself in a disorganized way with small jobs, getting little real work done.
Bilal kept faffing about in the kitchen instead of starting the soup.
Bilal 一直在廚房瞎忙，遲遲沒開始煮湯。
faff about — wasting time on small kitchen tasks
Stop faffing around with the cables and just plug the printer in.
不要再對著那些電線窮折騰了，直接把印表機插上吧。
imperative: stop faffing around
Trang spent the whole morning faffing with her bookshelves rather than studying.
Trang 整個早上都在整理書架上瞎忙，沒去念書。
We can't faff about all day; the train leaves at four o'clock.
我們不能一整天都這樣瞎忙，火車四點就開了。
The technician was still faffing with the wires when the meeting started.
會議開始時，那位技師還在那邊弄著電線窮折騰。
- dither
more about hesitation than tinkering
- fiddle
fiddle with X = touch repeatedly; closer when faff has 'with'
- mess around
American equivalent; same casual register
- focus
opposite stance: settle down and work on one thing
文法句型
faff about/around
faff about with something
用法筆記
Almost always paired with 'about', 'around', or 'with' — bare 'faff' as a main verb is rare. Strongly informal and chiefly British; an American speaker would say 'mess around' or 'fiddle'.
常見錯誤
faff — 名詞
1. a small annoying task that needs more fuss than it deserves.
麻煩事
費功夫卻不值得的小事
a small annoying task that needs more fuss than it deserves.
Renewing my passport at the embassy turned out to be a real faff.
去大使館換護照真的是一件超麻煩的事。
a real/right faff — fixed evaluative phrase
Eli said the train booking was a bit of a faff but worth the saving.
Eli 說訂火車票有點麻煩，但省下來的錢值得。
a bit of a faff — softer, common register
Cooking risotto from scratch is too much of a faff on a weeknight.
平日晚上從頭煮義式燉飯太麻煩了。
What a faff — Dahlia spent an hour just trying to print the boarding pass.
真是麻煩，Dahlia 光是想把登機證印出來就花了一個小時。
Diego dropped the form off in person to avoid the online faff.
Diego 親自把表格送去，省得再處理那套線上流程的麻煩事。
文法句型
a (real/right/bit of a) faff
what a faff!
用法筆記
Most natural inside the frames 'a (real/right/bit of a) faff' or the exclamation 'what a faff!'. Bare 'faff' as a subject ('the faff began…') sounds odd; learners should rely on these set patterns.