Word of the Day!

ripsnorter [rip-snawr-ter]

noun:
(informal, slang)
1 something or someone exceedingly strong or violent
2 something or someone remarkably good or exciting

Examples:

'Memphis,' his instrumental version of Chuck Berry's 'Memphis, Tennessee,' was a rockabilly-blues ripsnorter with a scorching 12-bar solo. (William Grimes, Lonnie Mack, Singer and Guitarist Who Pioneered Blues-Rock, Dies at 74, The New York Times, April 2016)

Listen up, dumpling fanatics, this place is a ripsnorter. Potstickers? Oh yeah. Xiao long bao? You betcha. Frilly shark fin steamers submerged in a chilli oil soup? Bring it on home, sweet momma. (Nina Rousseau, Eastern Dumpling House, The Age, March 2012)

There's a ripsnorter about a carnivorous tree-climbing buffalo, and a great sight gag when the three prospectors are lost in a blizzard and follow their own ever-widening trail like demented bird dogs. (Lawrence Bommer, Roughing It , Chicago Reader, March 1991)

Making all that happen is a savvy script that sticks to the truth only when it needs to and an actress who gives a gleeful, ripsnorter of a performance. (Kenneth Turan, Emma Thompson is a ripsnorter in 'Saving Mr Banks', Los Angeles Times, December 2013)

Poor little guy! He'd just about convinced himself that he's a real ripsnorter of a buck. (James Arthur Kjelgaard, Double Challenge)

"I had a ripsnorter of a fright myself last week," said Abe. "Was comin' down with an extra big load on, an' jes' past Black Gully I pulled up to give th' cattle a blow. Was squattin' in th' shade, with me back agin a coolabah, when something limp an heavy comes whack on to me head an' begins to claw an' scratch about like fightin' tomcats." (Edward S Sorenson, Aunt Jo - A Love Story of the Cedar Scrubs)

Origin:

'something of exceptional strength, someone of remarkable qualities,' 1840 [Davy Crockett], probably from rip ('tear apart, cut open or off', c 1400, rippen, 'pull out sutures,' probably from a North Sea Germanic language (compare Flemish rippen 'strip off roughly', Frisian rippe 'to tear, rip'; also Middle Dutch reppen, rippen 'to rip') or else from a Scandinavian source (compare Swedish reppa, Danish rippe 'to tear, rip') + snorter (c 1600, 'one who or that which snorts'). (Online Etymology Dictionary)

Its first appearance was attributed to Davy Crockett ('Of all the ripsnorters I ever tutched upon, thar never war one that could pull her boat alongside of Grace Peabody'). But as the word appeared in one of a series of almanacs bearing his name in 1840, four years after he died at the Alamo, we must take the link with a pinch of salt - as we must such other supposed coinages of his as circumflustercated and scentoriferous, part of the largely fictitious tall-talking vocabulary of mountain men that the almanacs almost single-handedly invented. Snorter has had various senses that imply that something is an extreme or remarkable case of its kind. To take one example, around the time that ripsnorter appeared, snorter was applied to an especially ferocious storm, a sense that is alluded to in the slightly opaque example from the Crockett almanacs... Rip may be a more-or-less meaningless intensifier, as it is in words like rip-roaring, though its sense of 'rip' or 'tear' may contribute energy and vigour. However, the storm sense of ripsnorter's second element suggest rip might have another of its meanings, a stretch of broken water, as in rip tide and rip current. (World Wide Words)

highfalutin, highfalutin' [hahy-fuh-loot-n]

adjective:
(informal) seeming or trying to seem superior, important, etc; pompous; pretentious

Examples:

When you study English Literature you're given this highfalutin poetry that you really have to get into - that once you understand, you can really appreciate. But actually getting to that point takes a while. (Stories for unsettling times, chosen by Anita Rani, Jo Brand, Richard Armitage and Rob Delaney, The State Journal-Register, November 2023)

The only thing not funny about it is that it's essentially a shibboleth, a secret handshake for the vainglorious highfalutin pseuds who use it. (James Gingell, How to write the shortest joke in the world, The Guardian, February 2016)

If it seems strange to hold a fast-food company to such highfalutin standards, it may also be just what Burger King is going for with its new 'thick, hardwood-smoked bacon'-garnished creation. (Rachel Arons, Why Does Fancy Fast Food Make Us Mad?, The New Yorker, October 2012)

He had been prepared to find her a most difficult young woman to get acquainted with. Yet here it was proving so simple. There was nothing highfalutin about her company manners - it was by this homely phrase that he differentiated this Dede on horseback from the Dede with the office manners whom he had always known. (Jack London, Burning Daylight)

I'm glad you didn't load him down with some highfalutin, romantic name that he'd be ashamed of when he gets to be a grandfather. ( L M Montgomery, Anne's House of Dreams)

Origin:

1839, US slang, possibly from high-flying or high-flown, or even fluting. As a noun from 1848 (Online Etymology Dictionary)

This Monday night shivaree is ideal to calm those who got too excited opening Christmas gifts. (Nick Canepacolumnist, Column: Nick Canepa’s Chargers grades vs. Tennessee Titans, The San Diego Union-Tribune, December 2022)

To the kids it meant running around the house beating on pots and buckets and dishpans, having a wonderful time making the biggest and worst racket possible. To the women it meant preparing and toting a mountain of food and doing a lot of gabbing and staying busy in the kitchen. To the young man getting married, well, the shivaree was something to be real glad when it was over. (Tennessee Ernie Ford, This is my Story, This is my Song)

The shivaree starts just after dark and includes loud banging, hollering, and serenading. Putting the couple in a wheel barrel and pushing them around is sometimes part of the fun as well. (June Is The Time For A Shivaree, Blind Pig and the Acorn, June 2008)

Jest the same it 'ud sure surprise me if we didn't git some sort of a shivaree pahty afteh nightfall. (J Allan Dunn, Rimrock Trail)

I wanted to keep Man sober, and I tried to get him and his wife out of town before that shivaree of yours was pulled off. (B M Bower, Lonesome Land)

Origin:

In 19th century rural America, a newly-married couple might be treated to a mock serenade, performed with pots, pans, homemade instruments, and other noisemakers. Such cacophonous serenades were traditionally considered especially appropriate for second marriages or for unions deemed incongruous because of an age discrepancy or some other cause. In the eastern US this custom, imported from rural England, was simply called a 'serenade' or known under various local names. In much of the central US and Canada, however, it was called a 'shivaree,' a loan from French charivari, which denotes the same folk custom in France. In more recent years, 'shivaree' has also developed broader senses; it is sometimes used to mean simply 'a cacophony' or 'a celebration.' (Merriam-Webster)

worrywart [wur-ee-wawrt, wuhr-]

noun:
a person who tends to worry habitually and often needlessly; pessimist; fussbudget.

Examples:

Theo (aka Turbo, voiced by Ryan Reynolds) is an outcast in the garden: he loves speed much to his brother's embarrassment (Paul Giamatti, who brings his argumentative worrywart character to the mollusk world) (Cathy Dawson March and Bethany March, Film review: Turbo: A 13-year-old’s take on this animated dud, The Globe and Mail, July 2013)

A recent paper, published in the journal Social & Personality Psychology Compass, reveals that being a worrywart might actually be good for your health. (Jordan Rosenfeld, Psychologists have great news for people who worry a lot, Psychology Today, May 2017)

But until now, researchers assumed that vertebrates were the only worrywarts among the world’s diverse life forms. (Rachel Nuwer, Crawfish, Like Humans, Are Anxious Worrywarts , Smithsonian, June 2014)

All the people who laughed off the “worrywarts” years ago for freaking out about the Funny Dancing Robot Dogs (tm) should be forced to watch this video once a day for the remainder of the year. (Kyle Koster, Let's Check In On Those Adorable Robot Dogs and See What They're Up To, The Big Lead, July 2022)

For tips on preparing for the experience, I reached out to experts and to long-haul frequent fliers — and learned that I may be a worrywart. Many of my queries were generally answered with responses that would be applicable to any but the shortest, commuter-hop flights ( Walter Nicklin, He was dreading his 13-hour flight. So he asked experts for some tips., The Washington Post, November 2019)

(click to enlarge)

It was originally American and remains widely known there (not only in the deep South), though it has long since migrated to other parts of the world. It's not particularly common in the UK but does turn up from time to time:

Instead of wandering about in a joyful, pregnant haze, I became an obsessive worry wart. I didn't even dare buy baby clothes. Daily Telegraph, 28 Apr. 2014.

The origin, as so often with popular phrases, is a comic strip. In this case, it was the highly popular Out Our Way by J R Williams, which began life in 1922 and ran until 1977. In the early days it often featured a small-town family. One of the boys, aged about eight, was nicknamed Worry Wart by his elder brother. In one early frame, the boy is in bed alongside an open window, his bedclothes and face blackened with soot from nearby factory chimneys. He gets an unsympathetic reaction from his brother:

So somebody told you it was good fer you t'sleep with a winder open, hah? Well answer me this, Worry Wart, without no sarcasticism - does this somebody live in a shop neighborhood? Out Our Way, by J R Williams, in the Canton Daily News (Canton, Ohio), 3 Apr. 1929.

The phrase came into the language at around this time and became quite popular in the 1930s because Williams produced many gently humorous cartoons featuring Worry Wart.

What's intriguing about its early history is that it didn't mean what it does now - somebody who constantly worries about everything and anything. Instead it took its sense from the cartoon - a child who annoys everyone through being a pest or nuisance. An early reference is a story from April 1930 in a Texan newspaper, the Quanah Tribune Chief: 'Elmo Dansby (the school worry wart) informed us that he was going to get him a girl and have a big time.' He doesn't sound like a worrier. An odd enquiry a little later in the decade (presumably a humorous squib and not a genuine question) shows the meaning well:

Dear Pat and Mike: I am a young squirt in the Sophomore class. I have many bad habits such as trying to act smart, pestering the teachers, am the biggest worry wart in school and think I am very cute. Tell me a way to overcome these bad habits. - Worry Wart.
Dear Worry Wart: When you find out what people think of you, you will automatically drop them. Lockhart Post-Register (Texas), 8 Nov. 1934.

This meaning was still the usual one when the phrase began to appear in Australia after the Second World War, but by the 1950s it was being used there in the way we do now. It took some years more for the meaning to change over completely in the US. By the time it reached us here in the UK it had only the current sense.

So where does it come from? There has long been a belief that warts are caused by worry and stress, which presumably accounts for the current meaning. And the original sense may have been provoked through the idea that warts are often an itchy nuisance. They invite one to scratch and worry at them, which only makes things worse. (World Wide Words)

cockamamie [kok-uh-mey-mee]

noun:
(Informal, slang) ridiculous, pointless, or nonsensical

Examples:

They came up with this cockamamie story about bullying basically - it was basically dog-whistling, that I was bullying my partner. (Sam Moore, Danny John-Jules hits out at 'filthy' Strictly Come Dancing, The IndependentMarch 2022)

Before sharing with investors yet another cockamamie report, Holmes added the corporate logos of two venerable laboratories, Schering-Plough and Pfizer, though neither lab knew anything of the report. (David Von Drehle, On trial, Elizabeth Holmes keeps playing the smoke-and-mirrors game, The Washington Post, November 2021)

To paraphrase the writer Nelson Algren, never play cards with a man called Doc; never eat at a place called Mom's; never trust a movie that requires a ton of portentous narration to set up a cockamamie story. (John Anderson, 'Infinite' Review: A Not-So-Pleasant Trip Down Memory Lane , The Wall Street Journal, June 2021)

Origin:

American English slang word attested by 1946, popularized c 1960, but said to be New York City children's slang from mid-1920s; perhaps an alteration of decalcomania (see decal). There is a 1945 recorded use of the word apparently meaning a kind of temporary tattoo used by children. (Online Etymology Dictionary)

Cockamamie - something ridiculous, incredible or implausible - is an intrinsically funny word, but it's truly incredible that word historians believe it's a close relative of decal, a design prepared on special paper for transfer to another surface. (It is instead sometimes said to be Yiddish, but this turns out not to be the case.)

The original of both cockamamie and decal is the French décalcomanie, which was created in the early 1860s to refer to the craze for decorating objects with transfers (it combines décalquer, to transport a tracing, with manie, a mania or craze). The craze, and the word, soon transferred to Britain ' it's recorded in the magazine The Queen on 27 February 1864: 'There are few employments for leisure hours which for the past eighteen months have proved either so fashionable or fascinating as decalcomanie'. It reached the United States around 1869 and - to judge from the number of newspaper references in that year - became as wildly popular as it had earlier in France and Britain. The word was quickly Anglicised as decalcomania and in the 1950s it became abbreviated to decal.

The link between decalcomania and cockamamie isn't proved, but the evidence suggests strongly that children in New York City in the 1930s (or perhaps a decade earlier) converted the one into the other. There was a fashion for self-decoration at that period, using coloured transfers given away with candy and chewing gum. Shelly Winters wrote of cockamamie in The New York Times in 1956 that 'This word, translated from the Brooklynese, is the authorized pronunciation of decalcomania. Anyone there who calls a cockamamie a decalcomania is stared at.'

Quite how the word changed sense to mean something incredible is least clear of all. An early sense was of something inferior or second-rate, which presumably referred to the poor quality of the cheap transfers. It might have been influenced by words such as cock-and-bull or poppycock. Anyone who adopted the craze for sticking transfers on oneself may have been regarded by adults or more serious-minded youngsters as silly - certainly the first sense was of a person who was ridiculous or crazy; the current sense came along a few years later. (World Wide Words)