fidget

present singular third person fidgets · participle present fidgeting · participle present rare fidgetting · participle past fidgeted · past fidgeted · participle past rare fidgetted · past rare fidgetted

1. intransitiveTo wiggle or twitch; to move the body, especially the fingers, around nervously or idly.

   Will you stop fucking about and fidgeting in my peripherals? I'm trying to concentrate.

   1993, Mike Leigh, Naked, spoken by Johnny (David Thewlis)

   1 more example

   "Look, Jim, how my fingers fidget," he continued, in the pleading tone. "I can't keep e'm still, not I."

   1881–1882, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, London; Paris: Cassell & Company, published 14 November 1883, →OCLC

2. transitiveTo cause to fidget; to make uneasy.

   “Do I fidget you ?” he asked apologetically, whilst his long bony fingers buried themselves, string, knots, and all, into the capacious pockets of his magnificent tweed ulster.

   1904–1905, Baroness Orczy [i.e., Emma Orczy], chapter 1, in The Case of Miss Elliott, London: T[homas] Fisher Unwin, published 1905, →OCLC; republished as popular edition, London: Greening & Co., 1909, OCLC 11192831, quoted in The Case of Miss Elliott (ebook no. 2000141h.html), Australia: Project Gutenberg of Australia, February 2020

   1 more example

   Being of a very cleanly habit, he was constantly rubbing himself in order to preserve the whiteness of his skin unsullied. The scurf which was thus removed from his person he laid on one side, till it gathered in such a heap as to fidget him. To be rid of it he constructed the earth out of it.

   1918, James George Frazer, Folk-Lore In The Old Testament, volume 1, page 16

plural fidgets

1. countableA nervous wriggling or twitching motion.
2. countableinformalA person who fidgets, especially habitually.

   Synonyms: fidgeter

3. countableAn object, such as a tool or toy, intended to be fidgeted with.
4. abbreviationuncountableShort for fidget house.