And so we reach the end of these for now. I've loved researching this, they've been great fun to do. And thank you for all your responses.
ulu - a short-handled knife with a broad crescent-shaped blade, used by Inuit women.
umbriferous - shady
uncinate - (of a part of the body) having a hooked shape
uniped - a person or animal with only one foot or leg (was it Voyage of the Dawn Treader that had the one footed fellas who slept under the shade of their toes?)
uroboros - a circular symbol depicting a snake (or a dragon) swallowing its tail, intended as an emblem of wholeness or infinity
ustad - Indian an expert or highly skilled person, especially a musician
vagarious - erratic and unpredictable in behaviour or direction
velleity - a wish or inclination which is not strong enough to lead one to take action (new year's resolutions for example)
verjuice - a sour juice obtained from crab apples or unripe grapes (meant to be great in cookery)
vicinal - neighbouring or adjacent
vidiot - N. Amer. informal a habitual, undiscriminating watcher of television or videotapes (probably also applies to Netflix these days, I can waste days of my life on there)
vomitous - N. Amer. nauseating or repulsive
wabbit - Scottish exhausted or slightly unwell (Elmer Fudd was feeling sick?)
waitron - N. Amer. a waiter or waitress
wakeboarding - the sport of riding on a short, wide board while being towed behind a motor boat
wayzgoose - an annual summer party and outing that used to be held by a printing house for all its employees
winebibber - a heavy drinker
wish book - N. Amer. informal a mail-order catalogue
wittol - a man who knows of and tolerates his wife's infidelity
woopie - an affluent retired person able to pursue an active lifestyle, from the initials of well-off older person (I quite like the sound of a lot of woopie when I hit retirement)
wowser - chiefly Austral./NZ a puritanical, prudish person or a killjoy
xenology - the scientific study of extraterrestrial phenomena
ylem - in big bang theory, the primordial matter of the universe
zetetic - proceeding by inquiry or investigation
zoolatry - the worship of animals
zopissa - a medicinal preparation made from wax and pitch scraped from the sides of ships (this sounds like the early version of 'take two of these and bugger off')
zorro - a South American kind of fox (usually armed with a sword)
Zyrian - a former term for Komi, a language spoken in an area of Russia west of the Urals; at present the last entry in the Oxford English Dictionary
Zzzzz....
YOU ARE READING
Orangutangents
De TodoEverybody is somebody else's weirdo: I suspect I may be many people's. Consider this a brain dump, or indeed a Brian dump given the misspelled pseudo-entity who lives in my skull. Tangential thoughts, comments, ideas, and general Brianisms from the...
