putterings 374 < 375 > 376 index
or “fiddlesticks” (nonsense)
...Finally, the provisional suspicion that fiddles are somehow diabolical has its roots in the distant past. The slang expressions “fiddling around” (meddlesome puttering), “fiddle-faddle” or “fiddlesticks” (nonsense), “fiddling” (trivial), “to fiddle” (to cheat), and “a fiddle” (an arrest warrant) still convey disdain and reproach.
ex the chapter “Strings,” in Laurence Libin, American Musical Instruments in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (1985) : 101-211 (144) : link