8 October 2015

snafu

[sna-foo, snaf-oo]

noun

1. a badly confused or ridiculously muddled situation:
A ballot snafu in the election led to a recount.

Synonyms: snarl, bedlam, tumult, disarray, disorder, confusion, mess; foul-up.
Antonyms: order, efficiency, calm.

adjective, Rare.
2. in disorder; out of control; chaotic:
a snafu scheme that simply won’t work.

verb (used with object), snafued, snafuing. Rare.
3. to throw into disorder; muddle:
Losing his passport snafued the whole vacation.

Synonyms: confuse, mess up, bungle.

Origin of snafu

1940-1945; s(ituation) n(ormal): a(ll) f(-cked) u(p); sometimes euphemistically construed as f(ouled) u(p)

Dictionary.com

Examples from the Web for snafu

Contemporary Example

So is this snafu an image problem, or is the real problem the reality behind the curtain—a curtain that needed to be pulled back?
Let the Military Mouth Off!
Christopher Brownfield
July 5, 2010

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Today’s quote

For a country to have a great writer is like having a second government. That is why no regime has ever loved great writers, only minor ones.

– Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

On this day

8 October 1769 – Captain James Cook lands at Poverty Bay, New Zealand.

8 October 1939 – birth of Paul Hogan, Australian actor.

8 October 1970 – Soviet dissident author, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wins Nobel Price for Literature. Author of ‘The Gulag Archipelago‘.

8 October 1971 – John Lennon releases the iconic song, ‘Imagine’.

8 October 1980 – Bob Marley collapses on stage in New York. The following day he collapses while jogging in Central Park. He is diagnosed with a brain tumour, which developed from a melanoma that had spread from his toe. He died on 11 May 1981.