Words Of The Day: “dorkasualty,” “tremendouche”
I coined “dorkasualty” just now, after giving myself a two-knuckle paper cut with the Chicago Manual. The 16.42 entry on documentation now looks like I used it as a hot-dog bun. Earlier today, I dropped the hardcover edition of Total Baseball on my toe. Never do that. It fuckin’ hurts.
dorkasualty: n. An injury received while participating in or enjoying a nerdy activity. Syn.: “nerdache.”
Neither of these boo-boos is as bad as stepping on my own hand and falling over while trying to pick up a nickel (actually happened…while sober), or poking myself in the eye with a Latin-English dictionary (actually happened…twice), but I managed to space those out from each other somewhat.
tremendouche: n. A tremendous douche. Syns.: “Mayor of Douche City,” “Douchesaurus Rex,” “Il Douché,” “Spencer Pratt.”
Cousin B and I have tried and tried to get “tremendouche” to catch on in the course of normal conversations, but it’s not moving fast enough for our taste, so I hereby enlist the Tomato Nation to spread the word.
Tags: douchery nerdery our friend English Spencer Pratt
Why isn’t “Sniglets” a tag on this post?
A good start: http://bertc.com/subfour/truth/sniglets.htm
SOOO glad to finally have a name for watching my friend get hit in the head with a BB while LARPing at an event! dorkasualty FTW!
(Please ignore how I happened to see that event in person. Thank you.)
I’ll see what I can do about tremendouche. Have you tried Tweeting @joelmchale? He has the hate on for Spencer (who doesn’t!?) and he might pop that into a Soup and voila!
I’m still trying to get “catsturbation” to catch on: When your cat can’t get you to pet it and is reduced to rubbing itself on furniture, etc.
I will try to work dorkasualty into conversation around here. With our interests and level of clutziness, it should come in useful.
My roommate and I are trying to work “tetris” into conversation as a verb. As in, “I bought way too many groceries, so I had to tetris the fridge,” or “I’ve really got to tetris this bookshelf.”
Tremendouche is a winner.
@Georgia: Interesting; we use “tetris” transitively. “It’s not easy to fit a Costco trip’s worth of crap into a Smart, but I always manage to tetris it in there.”
Love that photo–Glee performs “Mr. Sandman”. It’s dorktastic!
I’m the clumsiest person alive–the type who pulls muscles while sleeping, who’s so uncoordinated I couln’t hit the side of a barn with a catapult and a dead cow, so I’m constantly injuring myself. Nice to have a name for it now!
I think we need a list of tremendouches so as to blitz the pop culture landscape all at once. Let’s see: Rand Paul. Mr. “Civil Rights is overrated, and Obama’s Un-American for calling BP out on its craptastic response to the humongous oil flow caused by its cheap, flawed drilling! Tremendouchy, indeed.
And BP’s a bunch of tremendouches too, while I’m up.
Tremendouche is officially my new favorite word.
Tremendouche is money. I teach a college-level intro linguistics class and we’re always on the lookout for newly-coined words; this is by far the best one I’ve heard in a while.
This wasn’t exactly a dorky activity, but it sure felt like a dorkasualty last night when I was looking at air mattresses at Target. I picked up a rectangular duffel bag that contained a portable cot/mattress thingy. I noted in my head, “Geesh, that’s HEAVY.” I promptly put it down on the floor on top of my naked (sandaled) toes. Ouchie.
Well, they’re officially in (a) dictionary now. I even made you a list: Tomato Nation Words
@Nee S: We call that the self-pet. Not as catchy as “catsturbation,” but I have dogs, not cats.
Currently rocking a serious blood blister where I pinched my hand on a microscope. Dorkasualty? I think I deserve dorkman’s comp, since it happened on the job.
@Laura-hee! Can I receive dorkman’s comp if I sprained a finger flipping off a co-worker in a heated, if mostly silent, debate over which of our bosses is a bigger tremendouche?
You need to submit these to !!
OK, so I can’t embed links. :-/
http://www.urbandictionary.com
“I bought way too many groceries, so I had to tetris the fridge,” or “I’ve really got to tetris this bookshelf.”
Interesting; we use “tetris” transitively. “It’s not easy to fit a Costco trip’s worth of crap into a Smart, but I always manage to tetris it in there.”
I think all of those sentences use “tetris” transitively. In the first two the direct objects are “the fridge” and “the bookshelf” while in Sars’s example “it” is the direct object.
And with that, I have been a synecdouche: someone who is pedantic about grammar and vocabulary when no one cares.
Natalie +2. You’re right, those are all transitive. I’m not sure of the usage term I want here, then, to distinguish between tetrising (“tetris-ing”? “tetrissing”?) the container and tetrising the contents; the commenter does the former, I do the latter.
And from one Garnhole to another, a deep bow in appreciation of synecdouche.
Sars, you may have the best commenters of any site on the web.
synecdouche – I love it!
I also use tetris in the sense of “tetrising” the contents – not the container itself, and that’s how I mentally read Georgia’s use as well (I had to tetris (the contents of) the fridge).
Agreed that tetris(s)ing the contents makes more sense than the way I put it. Good clarification, y’all.
I still can’t get over “pupplebee” — though I don’t know how to work that into every day conversation.
Jen S- I pull muscles while sleeping too! A couple times a year I’ll wake up with my shoulder and/or neck feeling all hurty. Sometimes my arm.
I never cease to amaze my friends and family by how I manage to injure myself doing the most mundane things. On one occasion I managed to burn myself, not once, but twice while ironing. I’ve also burned myself numerous times on toasters, ovens, toaster ovens, candle chimes, a container of chili fresh out of the microwave, lamps…basically any hot surface you can think of? I’ve burned myself on it.
I’ve also cut myself in the process of opening my shampoo bottle in the shower. There was nothing wrong with the bottle, it was a standard plastic one, but I managed to get a nice slice on my thumb anyway.
“Tetris” is definitely a verb in my life.
Thanks to Tosh.0 and Fabolous, I know unfortunately am aware of the phenomenon of “procrasturbation.”
I love these. I am obviously a synecdouche, since my first reaction was “Wait, aren’t those both transitive? Have I forgotten something since high school?”. And I’m currently tetrising my bookcase cos it looks like a Farenheit 451 incident is imminent.
I’ve also suffered from dorkasualties; the worst experience was 5 years ago at jewellery studio, where we use blowtorches, power tools, sharp &/or pointy objects, and noxious chemicals, all requiring liability waivers and safety gear to use, and I? Partially amputate my thumb in a door on my way back from the loo. (bows) I’ve never used that door since.
I always use “jenga” instead of “tetris” when I am filling the freezer, although realistically it should be tetris when I am putting things in and jenga when I am trying to get something out without completely reorganizings.
I also have three daughters, and often the 2nd child is doing something completely different from her sisters. This leads to the following statement:
“Honey, I have to go re-jenga the freezer, can you keep an eye on the bookends?”
Sort of on the same line, and since it was mentioned, we use Costco as a unit of measure in my circle.
“It didn’t matter that 72 extra people showed up – we had bought a Costco of cupcakes so there were plenty for all.”
Back in the day whenever I’d see someone on the TWoP boards getting above themselves with regard to policing other posters, I tended to think of them as Sarsophants. Not a flattering term, and certainly not meant for the many lovely and charming Sars fans. This was just for the suck-ups.
I also use “to Jenga,” but defined as stacking things precariously. The current cat-food supply is both Jengaed AND Tetrised (I should start capitalizing the latter, I guess).
It’s also a call-and-response term at the studio, whenever someone drops an armload of things, or a distant crash is heard. “Need a hand with those boxes?” “No thanks! [kebloff] …Shit.” “Jenga!”
See also: “Yahtzee!” (The new “…face!”)
@Jeane, nice to know I’m not alone! Dorkasualty reminds me of an old one-panel cartoon called “The Neighborhood”, in which a woman is sitting down in a chair and managing to light the curtain on fire with her cigarette at the same time. The caption reads “Like so many of Shirley’s small accidents, injury is doubtful but humiliation continual.”
Granted a dorkasualty is for when you actually manage to injure yourself, but humilation is always right there with a megaphone, bellowing “OMIGOD! HOW DID YOU EVEN DO THAT??”
Georgia and Jill (tx), I’ve been using Tetris as a transitive verb for some time now. I hadn’t thought of using Jenga, but that certainly has a place in my storage-space-deficient life as well.
This will catch on, I’m sure!
Dorkasualties…I once had an incident that left a metal mechanical pencil in six pieces, a hole in the wall, and a stab wound in my hand. Then there was the time I pinched my finger in a stamp. Paperwork is hard, y’all.
@Natalie & Sars:
Was I the only one who speed read the dorkasualty definition
Whoops – apologies for poor formatting
I had the chance to pass on tremendouche today. A friend of mine commented that another person was a douchelord, and I took the time to pile on. It got a rousing response, just so you know.
I feel really proud.
Ah, the dorkasualty. I am an expert at that one. I have gotten a papercut on my toe. I have sprained my esophagus (…or something) trying to dislodge a piece of popcorn from the back of my throat. I have sliced my thumb open on staples. I didn’t staple my thumb, no, that would be too mundane. I ran out of staples, opened the box to get more, and managed to shake the sharp end of a block of staples into my thumb. Stupid effing staples.
hee, having spent too many hours this past year lugging the Chicago Manual around on the CTA, this word is relevant to my interests.
I use “Yahtzee!” as an interjection of unexpected delight. Like driving into a crowded mall parking lot during the holidays, and having somebody pull out of a primo spot just as you approach.
Judging from popular usage on this here comments thread, it looks to me as though “nerdache” will have to do for “a injury received while participating in or enjoying a nerdy activity”, while “dorkasualty” will need to be redefined as “any injury sustained in a stunningly (and often self-perceivedly) stupid way”.
One of my (many) dorkasualties: I once almost gave myself a black eye with an upright vacuum cleaner while using the extension to vacuum along the base molding. I took the hose a little farther than I should have, then looked back (from a kneeling position) to find out why the vacuum wasn’t following me…
“Need a hand with those boxes?” “No thanks! [kebloff] …Shit.” “Jenga!”
just made my day.
FYI, I’ve been using “Tetris” for years.
@Felis:
I once bent over to pick something up while vacuuming and sucked in my entire head of hair. At work.
I’ve also gotten my entire head of hair wrapped around an electric mixer while making meringue.
Cath, please forgive me, but I just laughed out loud. That is awesome, and I hope you’re okay. (And maybe got a liiiiittle trim?)
Oh, I got used to the laughter by the eleventh time I explained to coworkers why I put my hair up to use the copy machine.
I’m unfortunate to have the type of hair that requires too much effort below a certain length (which I realize sounds ridiculous when you think of the time it takes to remove something covered in egg whites from hair) so I keep it long. But I’ve learned to make a ponytail in less than four seconds, so I’m able to continue cleaning and baking.
But if you’re a fan of “How Vacuuming Can Go Oh So Wrong” stories, you would have loved being on the receiving end of my middle school friend’s frantic phone call after she vacuumed up… her gerbil. It was a hose vac, so it was physically fine, but I still to this day crack up whenever I use a hose attachment.
I’m thinking that we need to get tremendouche to Jon Stewart somehow. This is the man who coined “douchbag of liberty” after all.
@Nee S- I just laughed out loud to an empty room. That made my day. Can it also be used when said cat decides to mash her head into your hand (that is holding a book, mouse, Wii controller, etc) repeatedly?
@Barb- Agreed. I can actually picture Jon Stewart using tremendouche.
I kept reading it as dorkausality which is really a superset that includes dorkasualty, in that dorkausality would explain any resulting state caused by immense amounts of being a dork.
This would shortcut me and my wife having to call each other dorks or preemptively call ourselves dorks when sharing opinions, thoughts and the like.
Old way
Me: “I love this DIY mason jar lamp chandelier thing.”
Wife: “Because you are a giant dork.”
Me: “True.”
New way
Me: “I love this DIY mason jar lamp chandelier on account of dorkausality.”