# bludge
## English
### Etymology

Back-formation from bludger.

### Pronunciation

* IPA: /blʌdʒ/
* Audio (General Australian):(file)

### Noun

bludge (uncountable)
* (Australia, New Zealand, slang) The act of bludging.
** 2007, Anne Barry, Playing with Fire‎, page 136:A friend offered him a job working as a handyman in his carpet factory – a Mr Fix-it. Effectively off the bludge and back on track.
* (Australia, New Zealand, slang) Easy work, especially a subject at school that requires little effort.
    Synonym: doddle
** 1997, Wendy Morgan, Critical Literacy in the Classroom: The Art of the Possible‎, page 145:Oh, my name is Gecko and I just thought the whole unit was a bludge, sometimes it got really boring. But like I said I could just fall asleep and let my group members do all the work. And still almost pass.
** 2011, Irini Savvides, Sky Legs‎:‘Seriously, you′ve got sheep at school?’ I said. ‘Yeah, heaps of kids here do Ag. Reckon it′s a big bludge, like drama.’

### Verb

bludge (third-person singular simple present bludges, present participle bludging, simple past and past participle bludged)
* (Australia, obsolete, slang) To live off the earnings of a prostitute.
* (Australia, New Zealand, slang) To not earn one's keep, to live off someone else or off welfare when one could be working.
    Synonyms: freeload, sponge
* (Australia, New Zealand, slang) To avoid one's responsibilities; to leave it to others to perform duties that one is expected to perform.
    Synonym: shirk
** 1999, Tony Shillitoe, Joy Ride‎, page 64:The second last Thursday in first term of Year Nine, Jason and I bludged school for the first time together. It wasn't Jason's first time. He bludged school regularly, but I never used to miss days unless I was really sick.
** 2002, Donald Friend, edited by Anne Gray, The Diaries of Donald Friend, volume 1, page 343:One of the mess orderlies had consistently bludged on the rest of us all day.
* (Australia, New Zealand, slang) To do nothing, to be idle, especially when there is work to be done.
    Synonyms: idle, laze, lounge
** 1967, New Zealand House of Representatives, Parliamentary Debates‎, page 3164:We had the member for Piako saying as recently as last year, when dealing with social security benefits and increases, “I feel myself that when we have able-bodied men and women who would bludge and draw the pension, there is something wrong.”
** 1998, Marion Halligan, Rosanne Fitzgibbon, The gift of story: Three decades of UQP short stories, page 96:Now, you get back out there and you bludge! I don't want to see anyone working, OK? I don't want to see any pick-axes, any hammers, or nothing.
** 2004, John SmythRobert Hattamet al., ‘Dropping Out,’ Drifting Off, Being Excluded: Becoming Somebody Without School, page 53:I mean, school′s like a job. If you work for it you get your grades; if you work your hours you get your money. But if you bludge, you don't get money; if you bludge you don't get any grades. That's something that I didn't realize when I was young.
* (Australia, New Zealand, slang) To take some benefit and give nothing in return.
    Synonyms: cadge, scrounge
    Can I bludge a cigarette off you?
** 1983, Max Harris, The Unknown Great Australian and other psychobiographical portraits‎, page 105:Gabriel was a classic bludger. He was a drop-out in the very modern sense of the word. The Rossettis were anything but well-heeled. Solid old brother William kept the show on the road. Gabriel bludged on the family. He bludged on his mates.
** 2004, Gillian Cowlishaw, Blackfellas, Whitefellas, and the Hidden Injuries of Race‎, page 135:Now an adult with his own family, this man has become conscious of different norms among his children's white friends, and that whites often see sharing as bludging.

#### Related terms

* bludger

#### Translations
### Anagrams

* bugled, bulged