# Made up words or Words You Use Wrong For Fun **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 25, 2016, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682 "2016-05-25T18:21:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Dante\_G](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/977dab/32.png) [@Dante\_G](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dante_G)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2016, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/1 "2016-05-25T18:21:56Z")
Just for fun, are there any words you have made up? Or any words you use that are real words, but you use them intentionally wrong? For me, I use the real word “flibbertigibbet”. I use it as a substitute for “F\*\*\*”. Screw up on something, or something goes wrong at work - “FLIBBERTIGIBBET!” ---
**Author:** ![Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/intergalactic_gladiator/32/112_2.png) [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intergalactic_Gladiator)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2016, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/2 "2016-05-25T18:38:31Z")
Cromulanet and embiggen, from the Simpsons. I occasionally use disagrievance. ---
**Author:** ![Doctor\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doctor_jackson/32/32_2.png) [@Doctor\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doctor_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2016, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/3 "2016-05-25T18:50:19Z")
You know the big buildings that have doctors and nurses and, most often, an ER? Those are Horsenpistols. ---
**Author:** ![Soylent\_Juicy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/82dd89/32.png) [@Soylent\_Juicy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soylent_Juicy)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2016, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/4 "2016-05-25T19:02:03Z")
I say “amberlamps” for ambulance because of that video a long time ago. (Google “amber lamps” if you want to know.) ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2016, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/5 "2016-05-25T19:05:24Z")
The “Schmall”. From a nearby mall of my youth where you’d see all the old retired folks gathered in the food court to schmooze. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2016, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/6 "2016-05-25T20:57:44Z")
I hate the hiccup in the middle of the word, so I call them “vegables” (vej-uh-bulz). ---
**Author:** ![Maggie\_the\_Ocelot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@Maggie\_the\_Ocelot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maggie_the_Ocelot)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2016, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/7 "2016-05-25T21:13:19Z")
Tons of 'em, I like to play with words. I use “coagulate” for “get together”. As in, “Okay, Rachel and I will go to Fantasyland, Jack and Bob will go ride Indy, and we’ll coagulate at Pizza Port at 4:00.” The day after Friday is Satyrday. There are others if I can only think of them… ---
**Author:** ![tenacious\_j](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/439d5e/32.png) [@tenacious\_j](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tenacious_j)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/8 "2016-05-26T01:49:58Z")
> [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](#): > > Cromulanet and embiggen, from the Simpsons. > > I occasionally use disagrievance. The Simpsons have completely mangled my vocabulary. Inspired by Homerisms like saxomophone, or household adds “MA” to almost any random 3-syllable word, like “telemavision”. Like you would say, made up words are perfectly cromulent around here. ---
**Author:** ![Mona\_Lisa\_Simpson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ce7236/32.png) [@Mona\_Lisa\_Simpson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mona_Lisa_Simpson)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/9 "2016-05-26T01:52:01Z")
I like calling the strange unintentional words or phrases my phone makes “autocarrots”. ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/10 "2016-05-26T02:23:53Z")
I use bits and pieces from various partial conlangs I’ve encountered over the years, sometimes in place of profanity and sometime just to express something succinctly. For example, I’m fond of “_noy j’taht_”, a bit of fictional profanity from the long-ago cartoon _Pirates of Dark Water_. The sound of it just conveys exasperation so well, without actually being offensive. I use “_get’ke_” from Lackey’s Shin’a’in language to express sentiments that encompass “please elaborate”, “explain yourself”, and “WTF?” In text media like chat, I often use a single question mark for the same purpose. (Oddly enough, people respond to “_get’ke_” pretty often; I guess the tone gets the meaning across.) ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/11 "2016-05-26T07:35:06Z")
> [@tenacious\_j](#): > > The Simpsons have completely mangled my vocabulary. Inspired by Homerisms like saxomophone, or household adds “MA” to almost any random 3-syllable word, like “telemavision”. Like you would say, made up words are perfectly cromulent around here. Wasn’t that done by Popeye a long time ago? I definomitely remember an epimasode in which he gets edumacated. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/12 "2016-05-26T14:10:34Z")
I throw the word “hurple” into conversations whenever I can. Which isn’t often. ---
**Author:** ![FairyChatMom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fairychatmom/32/21906_2.png) [@FairyChatMom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FairyChatMom)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/13 "2016-05-26T14:51:49Z")
I used to use _razzenfratz_ as my go-to cuss word when I was young and disinclined to utter profanity. Similarly, my spousal unit and I will call someone a _cheese log_ rather than say asshole or worse when confronted with said person’s idiotic behavior. It’s also been applied to the dog on occasion. It’s a curiously satisfying expression! ---
**Author:** ![Mona\_Lisa\_Simpson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ce7236/32.png) [@Mona\_Lisa\_Simpson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mona_Lisa_Simpson)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/14 "2016-05-26T15:30:13Z")
Of course my mother and I say “misled” with a “long i” sound, like miser has. We both mispronounced the word in our heads for years until we were corrected. I know others have mentioned it here too. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/15 "2016-05-26T15:42:51Z")
Not sure why/how, but for eons I’ve used “egg-salad” to mean “excellent”. I also use “ironic” intentionally incorrectly (ironically?). The other night I asked a friend if he was wearing the shirt he had on ironically. He looked down at his shirt, then looked at me, all puzzled. “Why?”, he asked, and I pointed out that it was wrinkled and needed to be ironed. We then went back and forth a bit before he realized I was just fucking around. ---
**Author:** ![Totenfeier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/4bbf92/32.png) [@Totenfeier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Totenfeier)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/16 "2016-05-26T15:47:24Z")
> [@Mona\_Lisa\_Simpson](#): > > Of course my mother and I say “misled” with a “long i” sound, like miser has. We both mispronounced the word in our heads for years until we were corrected. I know others have mentioned it here too. My dad had that problem too. He was an educated man, and laughed about it after the fact, but he always read “misled” that way - and didn’t, for a long time, connect it with the idea of “mis - leading;” he said he just thought that “misling” was something bad that people did to somebody. As for me, I long thought that I was the clever one who invented “coolth” as the opposite of “warmth.” Imagine the crushing disappointment when I finally Googled it and discovered that it has citations going back to the 1500s! ---
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/17 "2016-05-26T15:55:54Z")
I like to say “Sprawl-mart” for “Walmart”. I think I heard it on the Simpsons. Occasional variation: “Mall-wart”. I also say “cripsy” for “crispy”. I think it was an honest mispronouncement the first time or two, but now I say it on purpose. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/18 "2016-05-26T16:50:32Z")
I perked up when I heard someone else use “Bloodbath and Beyond” the other day. I use “dooficity” to describe the quality of being a doofus, thanks to a long-ago friend. ---
**Author:** ![UncleRojelio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unclerojelio/32/3160_2.png) [@UncleRojelio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleRojelio)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/19 "2016-05-26T17:31:17Z")
> [@Doctor\_Jackson](#): > > You know the big buildings that have doctors and nurses and, most often, an ER? Those are Horsenpistols. Hopsicles for me. I think it came from watching too much _Rugrats_ when my kids were younger. ---
**Author:** ![Totenfeier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/4bbf92/32.png) [@Totenfeier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Totenfeier)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2016, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682/20 "2016-05-26T17:40:58Z")
> [@teela\_brown](#): > > I like to say “Sprawl-mart” for “Walmart”. I think I heard it on the Simpsons. Occasional variation: “Mall-wart”. > > I also say “cripsy” for “crispy”. I think it was an honest mispronouncement the first time or two, but now I say it on purpose. This isn’t a make-up, but following my father-in-law, we always say “Wally World” for Walmart. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/made-up-words-or-words-you-use-wrong-for-fun/755682.md?page=2)