Theme music by Joshua Stamper ©2006 New Jerusalem Music/ASCAP
trying to explain a mix-up in my mail order to a clearly raddled clerk in customer service
How raddled came to mean "old and worn" isn't known for sure, but etymologists have some theories. One possibility is an association with raddle, a red coloring matter that was used to mark animals. From this, raddled came to mean "heavily made up with rouge" - a condition that sometimes causes the makeup wearer to appear older and more haggard instead of more attractive. Raddled predates the similar-sounding adjective rattled, which means "confused or upset" and comes from the verb rattle. Raddled first appeared in print in 1694, and rattled didn't appear until the early 1900s.
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