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Is there any word or phrase to describe people who are prone to minor disasters . For example some people tend to spill coffee on the table,drop glasses, get their food over-cooked, forget their wallet at home etc. I would like to know if there’s a general way to describe this characteristic faculty or people who posses it.

Please also correct/improve the question if you like.

Philip · Accepted Answer

Accident prone

Anonymous · Answer

Thank you. 'Accident prone' sounds rather grave to me. Where I live complex road junctions have signs saying 'Accident prone zone. Please drive carefully.' It just crossed my mind that in movies people sometimes use '*****-up' to describe something similar. Not sure if that's accepted in proper english.

Philip · Answer

I don't think we consider it to be particularly 'grave'.  In fact, we sometimes use it in a rather whimsical way. I even once heard a woman,  pregnant with her sixth child, referred to herself as "accident prone".  Of course, if your only exposure to the term has been to refer to a spot where fatal accidents often occur, it would seem 'grave', indeed.

CalifJim · Answer

Anonymous Is there any word or phrase to describe people who are prone to minor disasters . For example some people tend to spill coffee on the table,drop glasses, get their food over-cooked, forget their wallet at home etc. I would like to know if there’s a general way to describe this characteristic faculty or people who posses it. Please also correct/improve the question if you like.

tend to spill coffee on the table, drop glasses, overcook their food -

In very informal speech they are klutzes. They can be described as klutzy people (or more formally, clumsy).

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/klutz

Anonymous forget their wallet at home

Forgetting is different. absent-minded or scatter-brained

CJ

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