https://translate.academic.ru/%D0%BF%D0%BE%D1%80%D1%82%D0%B8%D1%82%D1%8C%20%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BB%D0%BE/ru/en/

Но, лучше это не применять!!
портить дело - ass something up, ball something up

Александр, ну Вы же опять меня опередили 🤝🏿

I did it! 💪

Эрнст, Вы уверены во всех вариантах. В translate. academic СТОЛЬКО бреда, что его нужно проверять.

Mess this up/screw this up/fuck this up. Мне кажется, нужен контекст.

ROCK THE BOAT doesn't mean to ruin everything, it means to call unnecessary or unwanted attention by "making waves" and possibly affecting something that's beneficial to you. For instance, let's say the CEO of your company met you at lunch one day and took a liking to you and decided to make you his executive assistant when you were just a clerk in the mail room. Now you have a nice salary, the boss's ear, excellent benefits, but you still have to park on the street instead of the executive parking lot. You decide not to say anything to him about it because you don't want to rock the boat. You don't know how he's going to react at you complaining about having to park on the street after all he's done for you; you want to keep things as they are and not make waves.

MESS UP means to make a mistake: "I messed up and gave you the wrong key." Я ошибся и дал тебе не тот ключ. However, MESS THINGS UP means испортить все дело. "I don't want to complain about the parking because I don't want to mess things up for myself."

FUMBLE ABOUT means to attempt to do something you don't know how to do until you get it right. "We spent two weeks fumbling around with Mark's computer and finally learned how to operate it." HOWEVER you could say FUMBLE THINGS UP to mean испортить все дело. "I don't want to complain about the parking and possible fumble things up."

BOSS has no place here. It just means to be a начальник or to act like one. "My boss is always a dick on Mondays." -or- "You don't have the right to boss me around - you're a clerk just like me."

The modern phrase is TO THROW A WRENCH IN THE WORKS, the phrase Ernst posted with the monkey wrench was used in the 40's and would sound really poetic and awkward today: https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=wrench+in+the+works%2Cmonkey+wrench+in+the+machinery&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cwrench%20in%20the%20works%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Cmonkey%20wrench%20in%20the%20machinery%3B%2Cc0 But it doesn't actually mean to ruin everything - it means to do something that causes a (temporary) interruption or halt in the middle of a project/operation: "For three weeks sales have been through the roof and we've been able to meet the demand in our factor, and, we're close to exceeding our production quota for the month. This hurricane is really going to throw a wrench in the works!"

🙏🙏🙏

😉

💪

Tatiana Gerasimenko, Я УВЕРЕН!! А ВОТ ВЫ КАЖЕТЬСЯ НЕТ!!
И ХАМИТЬ НЕ НАДО!!
НЕ НАДО КАЗАТЬСЯ ХУЖЕ, ЧЕМ ВЫ ЕСТЬ!!

Да я вроде и не пыталась хамить😲

Татьяна, не переживайте. Я тоже в хамах побывал. Это тот самый известный случай.

Не буду, Александр. Спасибо)))