Shemozzle

"No end of a shemozzle there’s been there lately," he said. "Marina Gregg's been having hysterics most days. Said some coffee she was given was poisoned."

I always found it helpful that we retained one elderly member of staff who could offer a different perspective. “Well,” he would begin, “the last time we had one of these shemozzles…”. The mere fact that he could remember past disasters – and had lived to tell the tale – was reassuring.

If Will comes out of this shemozzle.

[…] but tarned long and then a nation louder, while engaged in swallowing from a large ampullar, that his pawdry's purgatory was more than nigger bloke could bear, hemiparalysed by the tong warfare and all the shemozzle, (Daily Maily, fullup Lace! Holy Maly, Mothelup Joss!) his cheeks and trousers changing colour every time a gat croaked.

When does a melee actually become a melee? And what differentiates a melee from a shemozzle and a free-for-all? Or indeed minor physical interference? Hardly the most pressing of national matters, but probably the most interesting question going before Congress later this month.

For quotations using this term, see Citations:shemozzle.