The English language is full of wacky words and phrases. I mean who thought it would be fun to figure out how to spell some of them? Let’s start with animal sounds.
Zzzzzzz…. buzzzzzz… buzz… which one do you think is correct for the sound the fluffy little bee makes? How about ‘oink’? We all know this is supposed to be the sound a pig makes but who decided on that spelling? I hope you are starting to get the giggles over this because the sounds just get funnier. They say a horse whickers/nickers (isn’t there a wicker basket?) when it’s happy to see someone. Why is the spelling different and who on earth decided to call it a whicker? I have a couple of horses and the word and the sound are nothing alike.
Then there is onomatopoeia. Just spelling the word make me laugh! Definition: words that imitates or creates a sound. Zing! Pop! Boom! Whew! Zap! Ding! Got a favorite? How about ring-a-ling or jingle jingle? You can hear the bells can’t you. Even more annoying is the telephone brrriinng, brrriinggg!!! Or your pesky alarm jangling you out of your dreams.
How about the ones that are simply fun? Kerfuffle makes me smile and lollygag is just fabulous. Then there is the classic cotton headed ninnymuggins from a favorite elf. Another excellent word is collywobbles which means to have stomach pain or queasiness. To keep on the vein of weird words starting with ‘c’ how about cattywampus? Or canoodle?
A personal favorite of mine to use is bamboozled. Frankly I see this happen quite often with my riding students. Smart horses can easily bamboozle their riders especially if the rider is distracted! Need a word to describe over elegant fanciness? Try frippery! Or what about the opposite? Ragamuffin is a person dressed in ragged clothes.
You can’t forget doohickey and thingamabob when trying to describe oddball items that don’t seem to have a name. To top it off you have to add floccinaucinihilipilification which means the estimation of something worthless and happens to be one of the longest words in English.
Whew! Well now that you have had a chance to read a lot of gobbledygook I hope you have learned a few fun new words and maybe had a laugh or two. If you have some more to add, let me know!