Thursday, November 03, 2011

Let Me Count The Ways


The interwerbz has gone from impossibly bad to inconceivably worse (i.e. no service whatsoever for days) so apologies if I'm not dropping by.

I thought of this post while sorting and blanching a whole pile of organic brussels sprouts. I have the most eccentric and wonderful thoughts whilst performing mundane tasks. Talk to my therapist.

Contrary to popular misconception it is not the Eskimo or Inuit peoples who have 100 words for snow it is the Sami People.

However, the Irish could give them a fair run for their money with their many words for 'drunk' bearing in mind also that there is an additional twist to this as English isn't the historical first language of the Irish. But as everyone knows, the Irish embraced English and bent it into something extraordinary.

So here those words are, listed in alphabetical order. Feel free to toss me some more!

Banjaxed
Banjoed
Battered
Binned
Blathered
Blind
Blotto
Bolloxed
Buckled
Cut
Demented
Fermented
Flootered
Floothered
Galvinized
Gargled
Gimped
Hammered
Jarred
Knackered
Lacquered
Langered
Langers
Lashed
Legless
Loaded
Locked
Lubricated
Mangled
Mouldy
Mullered
Oiled
Ossified
Paralytic
Pie-Faced
Pished
Pissed
Plastered
Polatic
Polluted
Rat Arsed
Rotten
Rubbered
Rubbished
Ruined
Sauced
Scooped
Scuttered
Shellacked
Slaughtered
Sloshed
Smashed
Snookered
Sozzled
Spaced
Stocious
Tanked
Tattered
Toasted
Transmogrified
Trashed
Trenched
Trolleyed
Trousered
Twisted
Wankered
Warped
Wasted
Wrecked

15 comments:

  1. Thanks so much for this list, they are going in my useful words notebook forthwith. Made me smile too.

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  2. Friend of mine would refer to himself as "boiled" when he was smashed. Not sure if that was from the Irish.

    Hope your internet problems clear up soon.

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  3. Being Dutch, I'm sure I can't add any Irish ones. It sure is a long list. It must speak of much experience.

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  4. A comedy show (can't remember if it was QI or Have I got News for You) did a piece on how you could add 'ed' onto almost any noun for it to sound like a euphemism for being drunk:
    "I went out last night and got totally aardvarked."

    "Did you see Ben? He only had two beers and was completely cookied."

    :-D

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  5. We used to say we were palatic - and we very often were!

    Hope your interwebz problems get sorted soon.

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  6. It's curious that there are so many words for drunk but only one word for hungover. That's probably because when you're hungover, your brain is incapable of any creative activity.

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  7. Wow - that quite a collection!
    :-)
    I asked Himself for any he knows of from around these parts. He remembers a guy with whom he worked once describing the condition as
    "knee-walkin' commode-huggin' drunk". Not a one-worder but creates a very accurate image!

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  8. Ah, and to be sure, in my youth I was every one of them.

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  9. My ex was every one of them, and sometimes more than one at a time...may he rest in peace, or not.

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  10. Comprehensive list - think you've got just about all (and ta for the Sami clarification re snow).

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