Words You Never Heard

  Did you know that more and more newlyweds are taking separate honeymoons?  According to a report in the New York Times, many couples are no longer celebrating their first days of wedded bliss watching sunsets together in the Caribbean or sightseeing in Paris.  Instead, they’re booking separate, solo vacations or unimoons. What’s another word for your mate?  A poplolly! Apparently, one of the reasons for separate honeymoons is that couples can’t agree on where they want to go, so in order to avoid cagmosis ,  or marital unhappiness, they each go their own way.  To each his own I guess, but isn’t this missing the whole point of being married?  Then again new research says 1 in 4 Americans report they actually enjoy traveling alone so they can have some quiet time and not have to worry about another person.  I suppose this would make sense after 30 years of marriage.  What’s another word for marriage at an old age?  Opsigamy!    

  Recently 30-year-old Arne Murke and his brother were sailing a 40-foot yacht from Aukland, New Zealand to Brazil when they experienced a motor failure and lost all power.  Suddenly the boat turned to cause the boom to swing around knocking Arne overboard into the ocean. His brother tried to throw him a line and a life jacket, but the swell had put too much distance Arne and the boat. Without a motor or life vest in the rough seas, a rescue was looking impossible.  But Arne remembered a survival tactic he had seen the Navy Seals employ. He took off his jeans and tied knots in the ends of the legs and then inflated the jeans by opening the waist and pulling the legs under water.   Talk about a thaumaturgist, or miracle worker. Luckily, the brothers were rescued after being adrift for over three hours.  What’s a word for the fear of becoming physically exhausted?  Kopophobia!

  Germany is known for fast cars, and zee Autobahn, the country's system of seemingly speed-limit-free federal highways.  However, recently a proposal to impose universal speed limits on the Autobahn is causing outrage among car-loving Germans. There is a movement by the Green Party in Germany to begin restricting the speed on the Autobahn in order to lower emissions and reduce accidents.  And accidents on the autobahn often result in multi-car pile-ups. This is the dreaded “stau” where you can be stuck for hours. Call me a pusillanimous poltroon, but I think I would be a little frightened of driving along at over 100 miles per hour.  A pusillanimous poltroon is a spiritless coward. Hopefully, the two sides can come to an agreement that will satisfy both the speed demons and the pusillanimous poltroons.  What’s the German word for a partnership?  A  Vennootschap!      

  Did you hear about the diver who was almost swallowed by a whale?  Rainer Schimpf, a South African dive tour operator was swimming near a bait ball, designed to attract sharks when all of a sudden everything went dark.  A whale had come along and scooped him up along with a mouthful of sardines from the bait ball. Rainer was gasperated, but tried to remain calm to see if the whale would release him.  Talk about waiting with bated breath:) Fortunately, the whale was likely as displeased about the situation as he was and spit him out after a few agonizing moments. That’s enough to give you thalassophobia or fear of the sea! It sounds like a  gollywhopper of a tale, but it was all captured on film by a photographer on a nearby boat.  Believe it or not, the diver who was spared the belly of the whale has a son named Jonah!

  Television in America is turning 75 this year. Visitors to the World’s Fair in New York in 1939 were amazed to see moving pictures and hear sound coming from a small black-and-white screen built into a large wooden box! And then they were stunned to learn this technological marvel could soon be in their own living rooms!   The invention of television named after Latin and Greek words meaning “far-sight” dates even further back.  Patented in Germany in 1884, TV sets were sold commercially in several countries beginning in 1928.  The German word for TV is  Fernsehen. America watches more television than any other country in the world followed by Poland. Zenith introduced the “Lazy Bones” remote control in 1951, giving birth to generations of couch potatoes.  In Britain, another word for the television remote is the smibbly bibbly!    

    Students come up with some pretty creative excuses for turning in their homework late.  One student explained to his teacher that they wanted to wait until they were older and therefore wiser, so they would be able to do a better job.  Another explained that he was aware that teachers are overworked and underpaid, and having to grade more assignments just added to the problem.  I guess he felt he was helping out.  What’s a word for telling artful lies in a convincing way?  Mendaciloquence.    Of course, there are the usual excuses like “the dog ate my homework” or “my printer wouldn’t work”, but one of the more creative explanations given to a teacher was that "the police cut power to the neighborhood to carry out a drug bust, so I couldn’t use my computer."  What’s a word for a comical fib?  A  skiddledinger!

    Just like baby names, pet names are often inspired by current pop culture.  According to data collected by Banfield Pet Hospitals, character names from the Marvel movies were super influential this year.  Marvel fans gave their pets names like Storm, Wolverine, Drax, Groot, Rocket, and Loki.   Among some more creative names for dogs are TwaiSherlock Bones, Bark Twain, Chewbarka, Droolius Ceasar and Winnie the Poodle. In the United States, the most popular names for dogs are Charlie, Coco, Daisy, Bailey, Lola Molly, and Sadie.  Cuttycrumb is an old Scots word for the sound of a purring cat.  And when your dog or cat curls up in a ball to sleep, that’s called a  kreesal, a word used to describe an untidy bundle of clothes. What’s a word for smelling something by sticking your nose in it like a dog?  Snowking.

    It’s been said that Slang is language with its sleeves rolled up, but who knows?  The words we call slang today might just end up in the dictionary tomorrow. Throwing shade is slang for disrespecting someone, and being jelly is short for jealous.  Dime or dime piece is a word for a very attractive person, in other words, a perfect ten! People hang out with their squad or peeps.   Bae, an acronym for “before anyone else”, is short for boyfriend or girlfriend.  And ship  is short for relationship. If you’re woke you’re on top of current news and events.  If you’re, on fleek you’re fashionable, and trill is short for true and real.  Of course, I love new words so it’s all good or Gucci!  

    Valentine’s day is approaching wiki wiki .  Are you ready?  Valentines Day, or as some men call it extortion day, is celebrated around the world. In Malaysia, women write their phone numbers on oranges and throw them into the nearest river.  They hope that the person of their dreams will find the fruit and call them. You’ve heard the term “putting lipstick on a pig.”  In Germany, the pig represents luck and love and is often featured on Valentines Day cards and gifts.  The number of marriage proposals on Valentine’s Day is second only to Christmas proposals!  What do you call a poor guy who makes extravagant proposals of marriage but never gets a yes?  A gamomaniac! Sixty-four % of men do not make plans in advance for Valentine’s Day. What do you call the act of falling in love with a schnook when you ought to know better?  Anaxiphilia!    

  You must admit, there's no better feeling in the world than a warm pizza box on your lap:)  Did you know the professionals cooking up your favorite pie/  have developed their own language when it comes to pizza? Tip Sag is what you get when the pointy end of your pizza starts to droop.  This most often occurs with topping-heavy pies like Neapolitan-style pizzas/   with generous helpings of fresh mozzarella piled on top! Pizza chefs often refer to anchovies as guppies or smellies. The terms penguin food and carp are also heard in some pizza kitchens. Mutz is simply a quicker way of saying mozzarella and slices of pepperoni are often called flyers reportedly because of the way they are tossed around on top of the pizza like Frisbees. But be careful with a pizza that’s loaded with toppings or you could experience an avalanche.   An avalanche is what occurs when all the toppings slide off your pizza as soon as you pick it up:)!

  Rocco, an African grey parrot has learned to use Amazon’s Alexa to shop.  Rocco's owner Marion Wischnewski told the Daily Mail that she was shocked when she discovered packages arriving at her home that she didn’t order! It turns out Rocco had been using Alexa to order up his favorite snacks including watermelon, raisins, and broccoli.  African grey parrots are known for their ability to mimic human speech and the name Alexa has become a regular part of his vocabulary.  Apparently, Rocco has logorrhea or likes to talk incessantly and Alexa picks up on it and places the orders. Marion says she doesn’t want to keep Rocco from expressing himself, but she does have to check the shopping cart and delete any items he may have inadvertently ordered.  What do you call a person or a parrot who loves to hear themselves talk?  A popinjay!    

    Did you hear about the moose that wandered into a hospital in Alaska?  The gaberlunzie moose was able to get into the building through the lobby doors which were frozen in the open position. The moose chowed down on some of the plants in the warm lobby before exiting the hospital the same way it got in. A moose is the largest member of the deer family and can weigh up to 1500 pounds.  Moose have wide hooves that act like snowshoes allowing them to walk on top of the snow. Moose can have antlers that span up to 5 feet and weigh over 65 pounds!  A baby moose is called a calfmoose or a mooseling! Hopefully, the moose didn’t suffer any ill effects from eating the houseplants in the hospital lobby, but I guess if he did, he can always take an Elk-a-seltzer:)  

  Recently a New Jersey man struck gold, metaphorically, while eating lunch at the Grand Central Oyster Bar and Restaurant in New York.  While enjoying some delicious oysters, he was startled when he bit down on something hard.  He thought he had broken a tooth or lost a filling, but instead discovered the mysterious juggernaut was actually a pearl. Pearls, also known as Oyster fruit are very rare and are the only precious jewels created by an animal.  Shobi-Shoji is a term used to describe the shineyness of a pearl. Executive chef of Grand Central Oyster Bar & Restaurant Sandy Ingber said that in his 28 years at the restaurant, this was only the second time a diner found a pearl in their meal. Experts say the pearl could easily be worth anywhere between 2 to $4,000 dollars. Not bad for a meal that cost less than 15 dollars:) What’s another word for an unexpected gift?  A lagniappe.  

  A New York Post study states that women sleep better next to dogs than their human partners. Of the 962 women living interviewed, 55 percent of them said they slept better with a dog in their bed.  What’s another word for a soft and cuddly dog?  A  woopert. The study found that dogs were less likely to wake their owners in the middle of the night than cats or humans as well.  What’s a word for the fear of cats?  Galeophobia. In England, taking a nap is sometimes referred to as kipping.  A three dog night is a phrase used by Australian Aborigines, which means “a night so cold you will need to take three dogs to bed with you to stay warm”. First dogs steal our heart, then they steal our bed.  Does anyone else tell their pets when leaving the house “I’ll be right back, or is it just me?”  

  A French theme park is using trained crows to pick up trash and dispose of it into wastebaskets!  Puy du Fou Park located in France’s western region was experiencing a litter problem.  But instead of hiring humans to police the trash, they were able to train Rooks, a type of crow to do clean-up duties. The perspicacious Rooks have turned picking up trash into a game as everytime they collect and drop some litter in the trash bin, they receive a morsel of food as a reward.  Perspicacious (pərspəˈkāSHəs) means keen or intelligent. The park is now much cleaner than before the employment of these Sapient or resourceful birds and visitors who enjoy watching the Rooks as well.  Now that’s something to crow about!    

  If you like Kentucky Fried Chicken, how would you like to enjoy it in the bath?  I’m not talking about taking a bucket of chicken to the tub, but the colonel has just introduced a new KFC bath bomb! There’s nothing better at the end of the day than taking a long soaking bath in hot and bubbly, fried chicken scented goodness.  What’s another word for a great idea?  Unkabogable! The bath bomb comes in the shape of a drumstick, so you know exactly what you are getting before you soak in the delectable scents of 11 herbs and spices! This is not KFC’s first foray into chicken scented products. Past offerings included fried chicken sunscreen, chicken scented candles, and fried chicken flavored lip balm!  One caveat to all this chicken scented fragrance is you might develop opsomania, that’s a constant craving for a certain food to the point of madness! 

  We use a lot of slang names for parts of the body, but many of these terms have very old origins.  A shnozz, another name for your nose, dates back to the 1940s. You may have heard some people refer to your mouth as a rattle-trap.  This term originated in the 18th century and is especially applicable to someone who won’t stop talking.  The clapper is a 17th-century word for your tongue and refers to how it moves back and forth like the clapper inside a bell. Dew-beaters is 19th-century slang for your feet, alluding to someone knocking the dew off the grass as they walk. The word was also once used to mean a pioneer or an early riser—namely someone who started their day before anyone else. And sometimes after a big meal, you might have a case of the trillibubs, mid-1700’s slang for a bloated belly.  

  My friend Celeste was devastated when the city said she couldn’t keep her pet pig in her Houston home. It caused quite a brouhaha. Believe it or not, pigs make great pets.  Pigs are perspicacious and with a little food encouragement, they can learn many tricks. Perspicacious is another word for intelligent.  Pigs have very good memories and don’t forget easily.  Pigs demonstrate emotional awareness and respond to the feelings of love, hate, and forgiveness. Pigs are actually very clean animals, they will not go to the bathroom where they eat or sleep and since they don’t perspire, they just need some water to cool them down. Plus pigs are happy just horbgorbling around the house and yard. When it comes to pigs, Winston Churchill said it best: “Dogs look up to man. Cats look down to man. Pigs look us straight in the eye and see an equal."

  This year over 27 million people will be shopping for a live Christmas tree.  In the old days, families would have to go out in the woods, search for that perfect tree and chop it down. But Christmas tree farms have made bringing home that beautiful tree as simple as going to the grocery store.  But how did Christmas tree farms get their start?  In 1851, an enterprising logger from the Catskill mountains recognized the opportunity and hauled dozens of fir and spruce trees from his land down to New York City’s Washington Market.  Customers were conjubilant with this new convenience and the trees sold out almost immediately. Even though the advent of Christmas tree farms has made it easy to have a real tree in your living room, you still have to deal with the diddledees.  Diddledees are all the little pine needles that fall off under the tree. This probably explains why 21 million people bought artificial trees last year made by Santa’s helpers…otherwise known as subordinate clauses!

  Recently a traveler alerted an airline that she would be bringing an emotional-support animal on a flight from Orlando to Cleveland.  What she failed to mention is that this particular animal would be so bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.  Now that’s a bit twistical.  Twistical is another word for not quite truthful. Unfortunately, this caused quite a flapdoodle when she tried to board with her emotional support squirrel.  When she refused to leave the squirrel behind, all the passengers had to deplane while security removed her from the flight.  Not the best example of in-flight jettiquette. The airlines were concerned the squirrel would get loose and wreak havoc on other passengers, perhaps even jumping from baggage bin to baggage bin Cirque du Squirrel-eil style. What’s a word for the fear of squirrels? (Sy-ur-ah-phobia) Sciurophobia