Texts in the City

(Derby Street and Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow, October 18)

bibliobibuli

" There are people who read too much, bibliobibuli. i know some who are constantly drunk on books, as other men are drunk on whiskey or religion. They wander though this most diverting and stimulating of worlds in a haze, seeing nothing and hearing nothing."
-H.L. Mencken's Notebook 71, 1956.

(Word posted at 4 University Gardens, University of Glasgow, October 26th 2007)

barring-out

" The breaking up of a school at the great holidays, when the boys within bar the door against the master. Northern England."
-Samuel Pegge's Supplement to Grose's Provincial Glossary, 1814.

reiliebogie

"A confusion; a state of tumult or disorder. It may be conjectured that the term has some affinity to the old tune called Reel o' Bogie, as perhaps referring to some irregular kind of dance."
-John Jamieson's Etymological Scottish Dictionary, 1808.

tib of the buttery

" A goose; tib, a young lass; also, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, a wanton. St-Tibb's Evening, the evening of the last day, or Day of Judgment. "He will pay you on St. Tibb's Eve.""
-Capt. Francis Grose's A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, 1796.

scrud

"A mythical disease alleged to be very serious, painful, and socially objectionable...Double scrud, here the "double" makes the...disease even worse."
-Harold Wentworth and Stuart Flexner's Dictionary of American Slang, 1960.

The Washington Post's Mensa Invitational once again asked readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new definition. Here are this year's {2006} winners:

1. Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period of time.

2. Ignoranus: A person who's both stupid and an asshole.

3. Intaxication: Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with.

4. Reintarnation: Coming back to life as a hillbilly.

5. Bozone (n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future.

6. Foreploy: Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid.

7. Giraffiti: Vandalism spray-painted very, very high.

8. Sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.

9. Inoculatte: To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.

10. Hipatitis: Terminal coolness.

11. Osteopornosis: A degenerate disease. (This one got extra credit.)

12. Karmageddon: It's like, when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the Earth explodes and it's like, a serious bummer.

13. Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you.

14. Glibido: All talk and no action.

15. Dopeler effect: The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly.

16. Arachnoleptic fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you've accidentally walked through a spider web.

17. Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito, that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out.

18. Caterpallor (n.): The color you turn after finding half a worm in the fruit you're eating.

(Thanks to Michigan for sending this in.)

tea-leafer

" 'Tea-leaf' is for some inexplicable reason the name used by the police for pickpockets."
-Charles Booth's Life and Labour of People in London, 1903.