Word Finder - frittered

definition

(often with about, around, or away) To squander or waste time, money, or other resources; e.g. occupy oneself idly or without clear purpose, to tinker with an unimportant part of a project, to dally, sometimes as a form of procrastination.

example

He can’t figure out how to finish the paper he’s writing, so he’s resorted to frittering with the fonts.

definition

To sinter.

definition

To cut (meat etc.) into small pieces for frying.

definition

To break into small pieces or fragments.

The rival artilleries held each other too thoroughly to be able to spare attention to the infantry, whilst the Prussian cavalry, which had forgotten how to charge in masses of eighty or more squadrons, frittered away their strength in isolated efforts.

Now the unstable movements of the needles are of a mechanically irreversible character; the energy expended in dissociating the members of a combination and placing them in unstable positions assumes the kinetic form when the needles turn over, and is ultimately frittered down into heat.

It was at his advice that the summer and autumn of 415 were frittered away, and the siege not begun till the spring of 414.

He frittered away the resources of the kingdom in the unremunerative Swedish war of 1675-79, and did nothing for internal progress in the twenty years of peace which followed.

But it was all frittered away when I took up with Paul.

Our life is frittered away by detail.

Wright frittered away his time in the district beyond the Darling and did not attempt to follow the party to Cooper's Creek, and Burke, tired of waiting, determined to push on.

He never enjoyed the confidence of the court to which he was accredited, and frittered away his influence in disputes about precedence.