"to potter around"

or putz

Ich hätte jetzt "potter about" gesagt. Geht wohl beides.
PS: Gibt es dafür eigentlich ein gutes hochdeutsches Wort, oder noch andere Dialektwörter?

"kruschteln" kenne ich nicht, nur kruscheln ... (Hessen)
Herumwühlen, wuseln, auch das eingedeutschte pusseln oder puzzeln...

daher wäre mir als erstes "puzzle around" eingefallen.

... LEO kennt 'to potter about' und 'to potter round the house' . . .

Dictionary: to potter about . . .

... als deutsche Begriffe werden 'herumhantieren' und 'werkeln' genannt . . .

... ansonsten: Dictionary: herumfuhrwerken . . . ;-)

Das gemütliche (herum-)kruschte(l)n hat mit dem hysterischen herumfuhrwerken nicht viel gemein ...

Wo steht denn was von "herumfuhrwerken"?

... bei mir in #6. - Das muß aber nicht unbedingt hektisch oder gar hysterisch ablaufen . . . ;-)

Looks like we have the AE and BE here. The latter is certainly 'potter around' but there are vulgar alternatives. The finest example of the BE version is from Wodehouse, where Lord Emsworth managed to energise himself into 'pottering pigwards'. I'd give my back teeth to write English as sublimely as he did.

....

Potter is not in my vocabulary. Presumably it's BE. Like #2, I'd say putter. Putz also isn't familiar, though it sounds Yiddish to me and more negative, by assimilation with futzing around: related discussion: to futz.

puttering around (my grandma said this often)

putzing around (more vulgar due to the putz/penis meaning)

It looks like it's solely BE. Often heard. 'What did you get up to yeaterday?' 'Oh, nothing much. Jusr pottered about in the garden'

...

I recognize "potter about" - but then I've read a lot of British literature. I would normally say "putter". "What did you do yesterday?" "Oh, not much. Just puttered around the house."

Yep, BE vs AE.

Yep, BE vs AE. (#15)

Or BE+AusE vs AE. "Ladies and gentlemen, in the white corner..."

I (AUS) have only ever heard "potter around".

Or BE+AusE vs AE.

Now we need to hear from CE. Maybe we could have tag teams. :-)

Can we hear more about those "vulgar alternatives" you so conveniently failed to mention?

@#13: putzing around (more vulgar due to the putz/penis meaning)


since when? I've never known "putzing around " to be vulgar.

In the UK, definitely "potter", not "putter". (I guess this might be like "podgy" vs. "pudgy".)

I don't think "putz" or "futz" are used/would even be understood by Brits.

...or by Australians.

farting about, buggering about are near synonyms

...

Did you mean latrinatives? ;-)

@ Robert

I wouldn't say they are near synonyms at all. "to potter around/about" is pretty neutral. "to fart/bugger about" is not.

Farting about is quite neutral, only not terribly refaihned.

"The finest example of the BE version is from Wodehouse, where Lord Emsworth managed to energise himself into 'pottering pigwards'. I'd give my back teeth to write English as sublimely as he did." -

Seconded, and I might stretch to a canine or two. I have promised myself the complete Blandings set for my next birthday.

OT #25: I have promised myself the complete Blandings set for my next birthday.

Let's have a LEO whip-round to buy this for John_2! ;-)

"to potter around/about" and "to fart about" are different registers, in my opinion.

To me 'putter' is more doing handyman work, small home repairs, maybe crafts, making things. I picture it involving tools, but in sort of a leisurely, relaxed way, just messing around with things.

Maybe gardening would also fit. From British books I used to picture 'potter' as being mainly what little old people do in the garden, or maybe in the garden shed, but maybe that was because it rhymes with 'totter.'

I'm afraid that for the description in the OP I would just say 'Oh, just (doing) things around the house.'

A different register, to be sure: not refaihned, as I said. But it's still neutral.

I am assured by my midwestern relations that 'putz' is extremely vulgar; and of course, I knew what Putz means, but assumed that American usage varies sufficiently for it to be something quite different.

Kinky, I will love you forever! :)

I used to picture 'potter' as being mainly what little old people do in the garden, or maybe in the garden shed

No, fit and young and muscular blokes can potter around, tightening the odd bolt on their Lotus Elan, flirting with any passing female and downing a pint of John Smith's every so often. Think Terry McCann in Minder.

"putz" has, of course, several meanings; here's one of them:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/putz
Definition of PUTZ
: a decoration built around a representation of the Nativity scene and traditionally placed under a Christmas tree in Pennsylvania Dutch homes : crèche

here are some others:
http://www.yourdictionary.com/putz
the penis
a person regarded as stupid, simple, foolish, etc.
intransitive verb
SLANG to waste time; putter (around)


Bt even as a stand-in (no pun intended) for "penis" I find "putz" less vulgar - or having less shock value - than some of the other nicknames, like dick, shlong, love pump, etc. In fact, speaking in relative terms, "putz" almost sounds "putzig." :-)

This Midwesterner has never known "putz around" to be vulgar. And it was a household word bei uns. Sure, "penis" might be the derivation, but so what?
Calling someone a schmuck, on the other hand, might be considered somewhat vulgar by some people.
@dude: Well, vulgar terms usually lose most of their vulgarity when they are imported into another language.

"penis" might be the derivation

Ist das so? Ich kenne "Putz" (im Deutschen, wohlgemerkt, das sich mit dem Jiddische doch in großen Teilen überschneidet?) nur als ein Synonym von "Schmuck, Dekoration". Meine Großmutter hat den Beruf der "Putzmacherin" erlernt: das alte Wort für "Hutmacherin".
Das wird auch hier angeführt http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/putz
Wie es sich wohl in das ziemliche Gegenteil verkehrt hat?

RE: überschneiden
It's complicated, Lady Grey. Yiddish words often mutated into words or expressions that are completely different or even the opposite from "normal" German. That's true for shmuck, for instance. (Not that I'm an expert on the subject)

I've heard of putzing around, and futzing around, and of a putz meaning a stupid or foolish person, though the latter is probably even less common around here. But I had no idea that putz originally meant anything offensive in Yiddish.

There was some other Yiddish word that was like that that came up once in the forum, but since it wasn't vulgar to me in English, I didn't really notice it.

@wupper: that's true, which is why a lot of the Yiddish words like shmuck, putz, chazzer, farcockt, alte kocker, etc. tend to sound quaint more than anything, and anything but vulgar. :-)

Right, no shock effect there. More tongue-in-cheek.

Nur als Nebenbemerkung - ich kenne das mit weichem "g". Genau wie die Gruschtkiste, die in jedem Haushalt existiert .

und was befindet sich normalerweise in einer Gruschtkiste?

@wupper: http://www.forum-3dcenter.org/vbulletin/archi...
da gibt es eine schöne Erklärung:
Gruscht ist aus dem Schwäbischen und bedeutet so viel wie
nützliches, bisweilen auch weniger nützliches Kleinzeug, vornehmlich aus dem Haushalt, das oft in Schubladen herumliegt und darauf wartet, irgendwann einmal gebraucht zu werden. Das wären z.B. Korkenzieher,Schnüre aller Art, Kinderspielzeug für den Besuch der Enkel, Einweckgummis, halt allerlei nützliche und weniger nützliche Dinge des täglichen Lebens.

Danke, h h. Ja, sehr schöne Erklärung. Ich habe ein bisschen gegoogelt und es gibt viele Schülerzeitungen, die auch so heißen. "Nützliche und weniger nützliche" Sachen halt. Das passt gut.