Kludge rhymes with…nudge? I’ll be the judge of that.

Word Nerd moment.

A kludge is a fix-it that’s “good enough”, something “that’ll do” for now. I don’t actively use it, but oh I recognize a kludge when I see one.

I happily pronounced kludge to rhyme with fudge (the chocolatey noun) and budge (what I’ll do for fudge) until I heard an NPR report. They pronounced it kloooj, which rhymes with nothing I can think of.

They also knew the history behind the word, so I figured their pronunciation was right.

Later, I peeked at Merriam-Webster’s entry for kludge. There, too, it’s pronounced kloooj.

But what it rhymes with?

Oh M-W is just most obnoxiously wrong here.

Re-read some Dr. Seuss books, you M-W people.