jumble solving

I've mentioned my affinity for scrambled word games, I know I have.
Usually, I post about them because of the punny nature of the solution of the puzzle's answer.
That's been the case since late 2014, when I had a subscription to the local newspaper. My posting of the puns continued in February, March, and even April of 2015.
Then, like many trends, that pretty well ended in December of 2016, primarily because I let my subscription lapse.
I still do the Jumbles, but I rely on those papers left lying around at Wash Plus.
i thank You, God, for laundry day!
(smile)
I guess all of that came to mind because of the post earlier about puns.
Then I remembered I had a Jumble I had saved for about three weeks.
Was it because the joke in it was special for someone I knew?
Well, actually, yes.
I intended to give it to the running bear - who is now a 'bi-polar' bear, but that's another tale for another day - when I originally set it aside.
The cartoon image has four people on a racing oval. Three are runners, now standing around the fourth person.
The caption reads, "When the track coach's stopwatch wouldn't work, it was___."
The answer? "Bad timing".
Hahahaha!
However, I just mention that in passing.
(Yes! A joke from me!)
What I'm here to talk about is how I solved the scrambled words of the puzzle.
Let's take "i-n-a-p-o".
I tried writing it as "o-i-p-a-n"... definitely not a word in English.
Moving the letters to "n-a-p-i-o" really didn't help.
My third attempt, "o-p-i-n-a", doesn't look very helpful, but it sounded better...
leading me to "p-a-i-n-o", which sounded even better...
resulting in "p-i-a-n-o".
Another scramble that had me stymied was "m-l-u-t-e-b".
Yikes, right?
My first attempt, "e-m-b-l-u-t", symbolized nothing.
(See that? I've punned again!)
Rearranging gave me "t-u-l-b-e-m"... not quite... then "u-m-b-l-e-t"...
and the correct word rolled on out for me: "t-u-m-b-l-e".
(Somebody stop me before I pun anymore!)
So, my dear reader, looking for advice, I advise sounding out the words created.
As I always told my organic chemistry students, "If it doesn't feel right in the mouth,
it won't sound right to the ear. Try again!"
(smile)