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<HTML> <HEAD><TITLE>DICTIONARY: mudder - muffin</TITLE></HEAD> <BODY BGCOLOR="#ffffff"> <A HREF="a.dic">A</A> <A HREF="b.dic">B</A> <A HREF="c.dic">C</A> <A HREF="d.dic">D</A> <A HREF="e.dic">E</A> <A HREF="f.dic">F</A> <A HREF="g.dic">G</A> <A HREF="h.dic">H</A> <A HREF="i.dic">I</A> <A HREF="j.dic">J</A> <A HREF="k.dic">K</A> <A HREF="l.dic">L</A> <A HREF="m.dic">M</A> <A HREF="n.dic">N</A> <A HREF="o.dic">O</A> <A HREF="p.dic">P</A> <A HREF="q.dic">Q</A> <A HREF="r.dic">R</A> <A HREF="s.dic">S</A> <A HREF="t.dic">T</A> <A HREF="u.dic">U</A> <A HREF="v.dic">V</A> <A HREF="w.dic">W</A> <A HREF="x.dic">X</A> <A HREF="y.dic">Y</A> <A HREF="z.dic">Z</A> <A NAME="mudder"> mudder, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> (Slang.) <DD> 1. a race horse that runs well on a wet, muddy track. Ex. Experienced horsemen can distinguish a mudder simply by watching him gallop around the track (Cincinnati Enquirer). <DD> 2. an athlete, such as a football player, who plays well on wet, muddy ground. Ex. He had the most devastating weapon on the field; Navy's ... captain, Ned Oldham, a marvelous mudder (Time). </DL> <A NAME="muddily"> muddily, adverb.<DL COMPACT><DD> in a muddy manner. </DL> <A NAME="muddiness"> muddiness, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> 1. the quality or condition of being muddy. Ex. the muddiness of a stream. <DD> 2. (Figurative.) the state of being unclear or confused. </DL> <A NAME="muddle"> muddle, verb, -dled, -dling, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD>v.t. 1. to bring (things) into a mess; mix up. Ex. to muddle a piece of work. Do you want to ... get things all muddled up? (Mark Twain). <DD> 2. to make confused or stupid or slightly drunk. Ex. The more you talk, the more you muddle me. <DD> 3. to make (water or other liquid) muddy. <DD> 4. to waste or squander (money, time, or other assets) stupidly. <DD>v.i. to think or act in a confused, blundering way. Ex. to muddle over a problem. He meddled, or rather muddled, with literature (Washington Irving). <DD>noun a mess; disorder; confusion. Ex. When Mother came home, she found the house in a muddle. expr. make a muddle of, to bungle. Ex. The present Government has made an immortal muddle of the whole business (Saturday Review). expr. muddle through, to manage somehow; succeed in one's object in spite of lack of skill and foresight. Ex. to muddle through a difficulty. Can it be that, faced with the serious business of self-immolation, we shall abandon the immemorial practice of muddling through, and discover logic and consistency at last? (London Times). </DL> <A NAME="muddlehead"> muddlehead, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a stupid or confused person; blockhead. Ex. ... unrepentant stubborn fanatics or smouldering muddleheads (Manchester Guardian). </DL> <A NAME="muddleheaded"> muddleheaded, adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> stupid; confused. Ex. Can a country so impractical, so muddleheaded be trusted in a harsh material world? (Harper's). noun muddleheadedness. </DL> <A NAME="muddlement"> muddlement, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> muddled condition; confusion. Ex. Many of the little muddlements that confront me in the morning are not susceptible to that kind of research (New Yorker). </DL> <A NAME="muddler"> muddler, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> 1. a small rod of glass, plastic, wood, or metal for stirring a drink. <DD> 2. a person who muddles. </DL> <A NAME="muddy"> muddy, adjective, -dier, -diest, verb, -died, -dying.<DL COMPACT><DD>adj. 1. of or like mud. Ex. muddy footprints on the floor. <DD> 2. having much mud; covered with mud. Ex. a muddy road, muddy shoes. <DD> 3a. clouded with mud. Ex. muddy water. (SYN) turbid, cloudy. <DD> b. clouded with any sediment. Ex. muddy coffee. (SYN) turbid, cloudy. <DD> 4. (Figurative.) not clear, pure, or bright; dull. Ex. a muddy color, a muddy sound. <DD> 5. (Figurative.) not clear in mind; confused; muddled. Ex. muddy thinking. <DD> 6. (Figurative.) obscure; vague. Ex. Muddy writing is usually careless writing. <DD> 7. living or growing in mud. <DD>v.t. 1. to make muddy; cover or soil with mud. <DD> 2. to make turbid or cloudy. <DD> 3. (Figurative.) to make confused or obscure. Ex. Delivery difficulties and quick-changing models muddy the outlook for future sales (Wall Street Journal). <DD>v.i. to become muddy. </DL> <A NAME="mudeel"> mud eel,<DL COMPACT><DD> an eellike salamander of the southern United States, a kind of siren, found in swamps, bogs, and marshes. </DL> <A NAME="mudfish"> mudfish, noun, pl. -fishes or (collectively) -fish.<DL COMPACT><DD> any one of certain fish that live in muddy water or burrow in mud, such as the bowfin or the killifish. </DL> <A NAME="mudflat"> mudflat, noun, or mud flat,<DL COMPACT><DD> a stretch of muddy land left uncovered at low tide. Ex. In twisting creeks and inlets, on bird-haunted mudflats, ... the sea anglers will soon forgather (Sunday Times). </DL> <A NAME="mudflow"> mudflow, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> 1. an eruption of mud from a volcano. Ex. In Java dams have been built to divert volcanic mudflows away from villages and agricultural lands (Scientific American). <DD> 2. a landslide of mud following spring thaws or heavy rain. </DL> <A NAME="mudguard"> mudguard, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a guard or shield placed over or beside a wheel of a carriage, bicycle, or motor vehicle to prevent mud from splashing riders or passengers; fender. </DL> <A NAME="mudhen"> mud hen,<DL COMPACT><DD> a water bird that looks like a duck and lives in marshes, such as a gallinule or coot. </DL> <A NAME="mudir"> mudir, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a local administrator or governor in Egypt, Sudan, Turkey, or Zanzibar. </DL> <A NAME="mudlark"> mudlark, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> 1. a person who dabbles, works, or lives in mud. Ex. Illiterate mudlarks ... used to comb the flats around the London docks looking for pilgrim's badges, towards the end of the last century (London Times). <DD> 2. a gamin; street urchin. </DL> <A NAME="mudpack"> mudpack, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a pack of mud applied on parts of the body for cosmetic or therapeutic purposes. Ex. The American man has succumbed to cologne, hairnets, mudpacks for his wrinkles, and clothes cut to accent a handsome thigh or well-turned calf (New York Times). </DL> <A NAME="mudpickerel"> mud pickerel,<DL COMPACT><DD> a variety of pickerel found abundantly in the Mississippi Valley. It seldom grows more than a foot long. </DL> <A NAME="mudpie"> mud pie,<DL COMPACT><DD> wet earth formed by children into the shape of a pie. </DL> <A NAME="mudpuppy"> mud puppy,<DL COMPACT><DD> 1. a large aquatic salamander of the Great Lakes, the Mississippi River, and the eastern United States as far south as Georgia, having bushy, external gills; water dog. <DD> 2. any one of various other salamanders, especially the hellbender. </DL> <A NAME="mudra"> mudra, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> one of a number of symbolic finger gestures used in the dances of India. Ex. an Indian dancer who has in the mudras, in the subtle movement of his fingers, a rich vocabulary (Sebastian de Grazia). </DL> <A NAME="mudroom"> mud room,<DL COMPACT><DD> a room in which muddy or wet shoes and clothes are put when entering a house. </DL> <A NAME="mudshow"> mud show,<DL COMPACT><DD> (U.S. Slang.) <DD> 1. (formerly) a circus traveling with horses and wagons. <DD> 2. a small circus, especially one that travels in trucks rather than trains. </DL> <A NAME="mudsill"> mudsill, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> the lowest sill of a wall, dam, or other structure, usually placed in or on the ground. </DL> <A NAME="mudskipper"> mudskipper, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a small fish, a variety of goby, with movable pectoral fins and a muscular tail, found in shallow coastal waters from western Africa to Polynesia; tree climber. It often moves about on mud flats, jumping and climbing roots after insects. Ex. Of all living fish, the mudskippers ... demonstrate most clearly how terrestrial vertebrates with four legs could have evolved from primitive swimmers with no legs at all (New Scientist). </DL> <A NAME="mudslinger"> mudslinger, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a person given to mudslinging. </DL> <A NAME="mudslinging"> mudslinging, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> the use of offensive charges and misleading or slanderous accusations against an opponent in a political campaign, public meeting, or the like. Ex. Mudslinging for however good a cause seldom pays in the end (Sunday Times). </DL> <A NAME="mudstone"> mudstone, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a soft, sedimentary, clayey rock nearly uniform in texture, with little or no lamination. </DL> <A NAME="mudturtle"> mud turtle, tortoise, or terrapin,<DL COMPACT><DD> any one of a genus of freshwater turtles of North America. </DL> <A NAME="mudwasp"> mud wasp,<DL COMPACT><DD> a wasp that builds its nest of mud. </DL> <A NAME="mudwrestling"> mud wrestling or mud wrestle,<DL COMPACT><DD> a contest or exhibition in which opponents, especially women, wrestle each other on a mud-covered floor. </DL> <A NAME="mudwrestler"> mud wrestler,<DL COMPACT><DD> a person who engages in mud wrestling. </DL> <A NAME="muenster"> Muenster, noun, or Muenster cheese, =Munster.</DL> <A NAME="muezzin"> muezzin, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> the crier who, at dawn, noon, four o'clock in the afternoon, sunset, and nightfall calls Moslems to prayer. Ex. There was a break in the proceedings at 5 p.m. in response to the symbolic muezzin's call (London Times). </DL> <A NAME="muff"> muff, noun, verb.<DL COMPACT><DD>noun 1. a covering, usually of fur, into which a woman or girl puts both hands, one at each end, to keep them warm. <DD> 2. a clumsy failure to catch a ball that comes into one's hands. Ex. The catcher's muff allowed the runner to score. <DD> 3. an awkward handling; bungling. <DD> 4a. a tuft or crest on the heads of certain birds. <DD> b. a cluster of feathers on the side of the face, characteristic of the Houdan chicken. <DD> 5. (British Informal.) a clumsy, awkward person; bungler. Ex. Pontifex was a young muff, a molly-coddle (Samuel Butler). <DD>v.t. 1. to fail to catch (a ball) when it comes into one's hands. Ex. [He] ... muffed a foul to help give the Redlegs three unearned runs (New York Times). <DD> 2. to handle awkwardly; bungle. Ex. He muffs his real job without a blush (H. G. Wells). <DD>v.i. to muff a ball; bungle. </DL> <A NAME="muffin"> muffin, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a small, round cake made of wheat flour, corn meal, or the like often without sugar. Muffins are eaten with butter, and usually served hot. </DL> <A HREF="muffinee.dic">NEXT</A>