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11:03AM
Feb-27-10
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Grant Barrett
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Post edited 12:50PM – Mar-01-10 by Grant Barrett
What's in a pet's name? Martha and Grant swap stories about how they came up with names for their dogs. Also this week: Have you ever been called a stump-jumper? How about a snicklefritz? And what's the last word in the dictionary? Depending on which dictionary you consult, it might be zythum, zyzzyva, zyxomma, or zyxt.
This episode first aired February 27, 2010. Listen here: Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
(24.9 MB).
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Sometimes the process of naming a pet takes a while. The hosts talk about how their dogs' names evolved.
A native Japanese speaker is mystified by the expression happy as a clam. In Japanese, she says, if you had a good night's sleep you might say you slept like a clam or slept like mud. So why do English speakers think clams are content?
What's the very last word in the dictionary? Depending on which dictionary you're using, you may see zythum, zyzzyva, zyxomma, or zyxt.
This week's word puzzle from Quiz Guy Greg Pliska involves taking a word, adding an "i" to the beginning, as if creating an Apple product, to get an entirely new word. For instance: "This is how Steve Jobs begins a card game."
A caller from Princeton, Texas, remembers that after a satisfying meal, her late father used to push back from the table and say, "I am sufficiently suffonsified. Anything more would be purely obnoxious to my taste. No thank you." What heck did he mean by that? Discoveries about the expression and all its variants can be found in the article ", Vol. 55, No. 4 (Winter, 1980), pp. 295-297.
A Vermonter says he's sometimes called a stump-jumper. Should he be flattered or insulted?
Martha shares a couple of Tom Swifties, those funny sentences that make great punny use of adverbs, like "'My bicycle wheel is damaged,' Tom said outspokenly."
Why do we say that someone who's happy is in hog heaven?
Martha tells the story behind the term Tom Swifty. Grant shares some more funny examples from the .
Gradoo is a word for something undesirable, the kind of thing you'd rather scrape off your shoe. A man who grew up in Louisiana wonders about the term, which he heard from both English and Cajun French speakers.
Someone who says, "I'll be there directly," may not necessarily get there right away. How did the meaning of "directly" change in some parts of the country to mean "by and by"?
"You little snickelfritz!" An Indiana man says his mother used to call him that when she meant "You little rascal!" Although the term's meaning has changed over time, its original meaning was a bit naughty.
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Read the original blog post. |
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3:33PM
Feb-27-10
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Jerry O
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We found "zyzzogeton" a genus of large South American leaf hoppers in my wife's parents unabridged dictionary published in 1940.
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10:38PM
Feb-27-10
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Ron Draney
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Grant Barrett said:
Sometimes the process of naming a pet takes a while. The hosts talk about how their dogs' names evolved.
Inspired by Dorothy Parker naming her parrot Onan (because he spills his seed on the ground), I'd like to get a cat and name it "Nature".
[beat]
Because it abhors the vacuum.
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6:14PM
Feb-28-10
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martha
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Ron, thanks to that parrot quote, I'm afraid I just spilled coffee all over my screen. Nice cat name, too!
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3:16PM
Mar-01-10
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johng423
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gradoo – in the figurative sense as well. In a park in Atlanta, two men were walking in front of me deep in converesation. Suddenly one pushed the other to the side. His friend looked startled until the first pointed to the dog droppings he had almost stepped in: "Campaign promises!"
(Someone once said politicians are like diapers: they should be changed often… and for the same reason.)
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3:21PM
Mar-01-10
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johng423
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Post edited 3:28PM – Mar-01-10 by johng423
I took almost two months to name my dog after finding him (and not finding his original owners). "Jeffrey" is Old French for "divinely peaceful" and that fits him quite well. (Some friends thought it was an unusual name for a dog, but I said I was not going to name him one of those stupid pet nicknames, then have to stand on the front porch and call out, "Come here, Doodles!")
… Although at home he does get called just about every variation that comes to mind: Jeffrey, Jeffer, Jeff, Jeffy, Jeffonavich, Jeffersoniah, J-dog (he likes that as his "street name"), etc.
… Well, he's 15 now but just as quiet and content as ever. I have his photo at if you want to see his handsome face.
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2:14AM
Mar-02-10
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Ron Draney
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johng423 said:
I was not going to name him one of those stupid pet nicknames, then have to stand on the front porch and call out, "Come here, Doodles!"
When I was very small, our cat had three kittens, all female. I named them Tessie, Lessie and Gurp.
My parents found homes for the other two and kept Gurp.
For years thereafter, at feeding time, my mother would stand outside the kitchen door calling out in a loud, clear voice: "GURP! GURP!"
It's a wonder the authorities never came to take her away.
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2:45AM
Mar-02-10
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MarcNaimark
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Re "gradoo". I immediately thought of "gadoue", which means "mud". Perhaps a mash-up of "gras" (fat) and "gadoue" (mud)? Or just a deformation of "gadoue"?
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12:06PM
Mar-02-10
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Prokdoc
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My dog's name is Kuroko: Kuro for black in Japanese (as in Kurosawa, the famous director) and ko because she's a she. Nearly every Japanese woman has a "ko" at the end of her name (Yoko, Maiko, Saiko, etc.), and it means small or child (I think). I thought since she has a black coat, and since blackie was probably too silly, why not?
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12:51PM
Mar-02-10
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ArteNow
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Being enamored of mythology at the time, when I went to the shelter looking for a dog, I had a list of mythological names in hand as well as a list of words in other languages for "dog", "friend", etc. (on-line dictionaries are so cool!)
A puppy picked me and as I was driving us home I had her in an open-topped box right behind me. While driving, I was talking to her and trying out various names from the list. When I said "Callisto" she stuck her head over the top of the box and licked my ear. So she not only picked me, she picked her name.
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4:04PM
Mar-02-10
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Ron Draney
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Prokdoc said:
My dog's name is Kuroko: Kuro for black in Japanese (as in Kurosawa, the famous director) and ko because she's a she. Nearly every Japanese woman has a "ko" at the end of her name (Yoko, Maiko, Saiko, etc.), and it means small or child (I think). I thought since she has a black coat, and since blackie was probably too silly, why not?
I may have already mentioned the twin feral cats who occasionally sleep on my patio, the ones I've taken to calling McDonnell and Douglas.
They're both jet black.
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4:39PM
Mar-02-10
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EmmettRedd
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We have a cat my wife first called, "Snowball." However, he has a significant amount of black on him so "Dirty Snowball" was appropriate. That was too long, so now we call him, "Comet."
Emmett
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1:02AM
Mar-03-10
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Hankk
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Regarding Tom Swiftys: One thing you didn't mention is that Tom Swift's name lives on not only in puns, but in police departments, every time someone uses a TASER. The word is today a trademark of Taser International Inc., but stood originally for "Thomas A Swift Electric Rifle", which predates the formation of the company and refers to the same Tom Swift. For a cover shot of the original 1911 book, see .
-Henry
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8:30AM
Mar-03-10
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mlw
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snicklefritz… I have not listened to the show yet (I listen via podcast), but I too am originally from Indiana and we always used the term by saying, "I'm going to give you a snicklefritz", and then proceed to blow on the child's tummy (as you would do as a teenager to make a flatulence noise on your upper arm). I never heard of any "naughty" meanings. I always thought it was another of those variations on my German heritage. For example, we always used "gesundheit" when someone sneezed…
Your show is wonderful!!
Michael
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4:37PM
Mar-03-10
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martinus
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Someone who says, "I'll be there directly," may not necessarily get there right away. How did the meaning of "directly" change in some parts of the country to mean "by and by"?
Here in Cornwall (UK) directly, usually spelled and pronounced "dreckly" is considered to be the equivalent of mañana, but without the sense of urgency. Is the area the caller came from noted for Cornish settlers?
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1:13PM
Mar-08-10
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Nzalamba
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mlw said:
snicklefritz… I have not listened to the show yet (I listen via podcast), but I too am originally from Indiana and we always used the term by saying, "I'm going to give you a snicklefritz", and then proceed to blow on the child's tummy (as you would do as a teenager to make a flatulence noise on your upper arm). I never heard of any "naughty" meanings. I always thought it was another of those variations on my German heritage. For example, we always used "gesundheit" when someone sneezed…
Your show is wonderful!!
Michael
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4:29AM
Mar-09-10
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noah little
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First thing that comes to mind when I hear stumpjumper is the model made by Specialized. Ever spotted a stumpjumper riding a Stumpjumper? 
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4:45AM
Mar-09-10
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noah little
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Post edited 4:51AM – Mar-09-10 by noah little
About "gras d'eau"… I'm thinking about another possibility. I've heard a French word, crade, here in Switzerland that has pretty much the same meaning as the caller gave to this one. People say "C'est crade" to mean "That's gross" or "yucky". I haven't seen it written down (will have to ask, now I'm curious!).
Anyway, a quick google brought up from a French dictionary, which lists several variations, among them "cradot" and "crado". Maybe that might have carried over to Cajun French?
(Here's another with some variations that could work for "gradoo".)
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4:14PM
Mar-09-10
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adventure
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I've heard "gradoo" in Florida. It's like "schmutz." And they thought it was 'their' word. Ha! Though, that family has some crazy word usage. "Puny" to mean "weak from being sick" or "fatigued."
They have ties to New Orleans, though.
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3:01PM
Mar-14-10
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jenny
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Post edited 3:02PM – Mar-14-10 by jenny
A caller from Princeton, Texas, remembers that after a satisfying meal, her late father used to push back from the table and say, "I am sufficiently suffonsified. Anything more would be purely obnoxious to my taste.
I wanted to share my family's version of this saying: I have had elegant sufficiency, more would be superfluous abundancy. It was interesting to learn about the origins.
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9:54PM
Jul-08-10
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Northwesterner
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Post edited 10:00PM – Jul-08-10 by Northwesterner
I was delighted to hear the podcast of this episode. My mother used to use "snigglefritz" (note the strong "g" sound) as a term of endearment. Her family was from New Jersey, and the family used odd Yiddish or German terms that I never heard elsewhere. Another besides "snigglefritz" was "sitzfleich." I was told that I "had no sitzfleisch" when I was restless.
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12:57AM
Aug-26-10
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Ron Draney
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Grant Barrett said:
What's the very last word in the dictionary? Depending on which dictionary you're using, you may see zythum, zyzzyva, zyxomma, or zyxt.
You can beat all of those if your dictionary includes place names:
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2:50PM
Aug-26-10
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frabow
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Get the show via podcast. Listening to the re-broadcast of you 27-Feb. show when you thought that Zootomy needs to be in a Limerick.
So here it is:
There once was a maiden Pottawatomi
Who was as single as she ought to be
When mashed up in bars
By young randy tars
Would practice mental Zootomy
(punctuate it as it should be – not my strong suit)
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5:42PM
Feb-02-12
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bookguy42
| | Nepean, Ontario, Canada | |
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Hi.
I listen to the show on podcast and have a comment about "suffonsified". In the show reference is made to the word being used in Canada.
I was born, raised and lived in the province of Ontario, Canada. Other than on this episode I have never heard this word.
I've checked two dictionaries published by Oxford and checked online sources. The only online source that gives a definition is Wiktionary which gives the derivation as follows:
English
[]Alternative forms
[]Etymology
Possibly a blend of
[]Verb
suffonsify (third-person singular simple present )
- (]
As I said I have never heard this word. If there are others on this forum who are from Canada, please verify the usage.
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