fumfer

• phumpher

From Yiddish.

fumfer (third-person singular simple present fumfers, present participle fumfering, simple past and past participle fumfered)

1. To mumble, to mutter, to murmur.
2. To dither, to waffle.
3. To be evasive, to temporize, to stall.
   • 2017 Why Steve Mnuchin and Gary Cohn Are So Bad at Selling Trump’s Tax Plan by Daniel Gross

     And much of the blame belongs to the clumsy, hacky salesmanship of Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and National Economic Council Chairman Gary Cohn, who fumfered his way through an awkward White House press briefing.

4. To putter aimlessly.

• See Thesaurus:mutter