This thread is DOA, but I had to post this from Mrs. Byrne for all you word hounds. Use it with care, if you dare:
cornobbled adj. -- hit with a fish
Now many questions come to mind: If cornobbled means to be hit with a fish, then I suppose you can cornobble someone, perhaps someone with a fish wife's mouth...or mebbe the fish wife herself goes around cornobbling people.
Or does this mean you're cornobbled by fish with aggressive attitudes?
And, finally, is there any other word in the English language that means to be hit by any other animal other than the fish? Well, there's gored, for sure. And butted. And pecked. But they're not exactly the same in that the whole of the fish is hitting you whereas with gored, butted, and pecked, it's just a part of the beast that's causing your pain.
Best regards,
WordCornobbled
Edit: Just in case an innocent bystander should happen upon this thread, the above definition of cornobbled is incorrect. The whole mix-up resulted from a definition's having been incorrectly entered on the Byrne site. tsuwm caught the error. Hip! Hip!
On a scale of one to ten, this one rates about a seven. But you can indeed write fin-is to it. I did think it was a great word. Nothing in OED.
When I was on troopship in South Pacific, flying fish frequently landed on the deck near the bow, which meant they had to be more than fifteen feet above sea level. This was not much wind, although the waves might have been three or four feet high. They were only about the size of my thumb, and I was wearing a helmet liner, so I did not worry about impact. I have heard they are good to eat, but the only way I could have cooked them would have been by using my glasses as a magnifying glass. No thanks.
wordsind,
now that MP has been dutifully summoned to do their little dance, I must disencumber you of this misapprehension.
cornobbled - [adj] hit with a fist
Mrs. Byrne's Dictionary of Unusual, Obscure, and Preposterous Words - First Carol Publishing Group edition, 1994
p.s. - google turns up one hit on cornobble, which has perpetrated the same misreading and added some fowl play:
fowlobble - to hit with a rubber chicken.
tsuwm: So the Byrne site is incorrect? Or did she spell her definition incorrectly--or perhaps cite a reference that was also incorrect? I don't have her dictionary--just the site.
Love "fowlobble," by the way.
And then there's cowobbled: Hit by projectile bovines attempting lunar leaps.
Fist regards,
DoubleD.
Actually my first thought was Asterix.
Bingley
>So the Byrne site is incorrect? Or did she spell her definition incorrectly--or perhaps cite a
reference that was also incorrect? I don't have her dictionary--just the site.
who knows? I don't find the word in any of my other references. her dictionary has 'fist'. one google hit on cornobbled has fist (in a game of balderdash™, the baldmaster prolly has her dictionary) and one hit on cornobble as a verb has fish (prolly ref'd the site). unless someone finds the original ref. I guess we'll never know.
Hmmm...I can think of only three people in this world who should be cornobbled.
(1) The person who invented the word.
(2) Mrs. Byrne.
(3) The person who...uh?...wait a minute...it was just on the tip of my tongue...
cowobbled: Hit by projectile bovines attempting lunar leaps.
Please! You bring to mind a bit of juvelaia form my pre-teen years:
Birdie, birdie in the sky,
Please don't drop it in my eye.
I'll be good, and I won't cry.
(Gee! I'm glad that cows don't fly!)
cowobbled: Hit by projectile bovines attempting lunar leaps.
Please! You bring to mind a bit of juvenalia form my pre-teen years:
Birdie, birdie in the sky,
Please don't drop it in my eye.
I'll be good, and I won't cry.
(Gee! I'm glad that cows don't fly!)
Here's the Bryne site again:
http://www.textstore.co.il/mrsbyrne/mrsbyrne.htmSince I pasted the definition from the site, I'm fairly confident it was "fish" there and not "fist." I'll send 'em a note about it.
How 'bout "loblobbled": Hit by a flying conifer?
WW
(Milum, I know you weren't referring to me as #3....right?)
One notes that Dub-Dub has suddenly been expounding on both "hit by a fish" and ichthyophallia". To what do we ascribe this sudden fish-fetish, my dear? Has some poor fish been hitting (on) you?
Dear Keiva:
It was pure sinkronicity being cornobbled by Mrs. Byrne and then Philip posting about the fishy business on the other thread.
Dub
>Since I pasted the definition from the site, I'm fairly confident it was "fish" there and not
"fist." I'll send 'em a note about it.
until we get the <ahem> definitive word, any thoughts on which is the more *likely meaning?
(btw, you might want to look up 'nobble')
Dear tsuwm,
Thanks for suggesting that we look up nobble.
Several definitions in my out-of-date AHD here at school, the most interesting being "3. To outdo or get the better of by devious means."
But, even more exciting and greatly off-topic, are some good Scrabble words from the "n" words in the neighborhood of nobble:
nodi -- plural of nodus (that's a great Scrabble plural to play off of "nod")
noddle -- the head (I've heard of noggin and noodle for head, but never noddle)
nixie -- slang for misaddressed (but I don't have the dadburned Scrabble authority, so don't think this would fly in the game)
And, finally (a ta-da! word):
noes -- pl. of no (I'm a johnny-come-lately here, but I thought the pl. was no's as an exceptional plural form; ya' live 'n' learn)
Now to learn what a veeble and a fetzer are...???
DubDub
>Now to learn what a veeble and a fetzer are...???
good luck with that... but it's the whole furshlugginer thing that's of import.
the whole furshlugginer thing
I've said it before, but it bears repeating:
It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide.
This is Mad®, do you hear me? Mad®!
CORNOBBLED!! Are you hogswoggling me?
Dear WW,
No. I was not referring to you when I posted a list of people who should be cornobbled. I posted this list before the great tsuwm (swim, swam, suwm, the T is silent)straightened out one billion speakers of the english language by belatedly announcing that "cornobbled" meant being hit by a fist, not a fish. No, I was not referring to you, I was referring to the...uh...Devil?...yes, thats it, no one likes the Devil.
As for you, I still think WW stands for Wonderful Wonderful.
Milum.
Dear Milum,
What a wonderful wonderful way to wake up.
As for me, I'm going to use cornobbled both ways. There's bound to be a very posh word meaning an incorrect definition that has come into general acceptance through general abuse and overuse.
Best regards,
WordNobbled
Well, I checked the Byrne site tonight and finally hit cornobbled again. Sure enough, this is a paste of exactly what I read:
"cornobbled adj. -- hit with a fish. "
...but, as I wrote tsuwm, there was also:
"patavinity n. -- the use of local works or expressions."
Ironically, if you search the Byrne site, there's a page on the benefits of editing...
If you think about it, "cornobbled" could mean to fall in love through deception... There's some fishy business to chew on! (Roxanne was cornobbled by Christian...)
Best regards,
WW
If you think about it, "cornobbled" could mean to fall in love through deception... There's some fishy business
to chew on! (Roxanne was cornobbled by Christian...)Struck by a flying codpiece? Hmmmm.... Maybe WW stands for Wild Woman.
I too got hit by a fish: cornobbled adj. -- hit with a fish. After clicking 'More' in Mrs. Byrne's site for about fifteen minutes. I can picture the codfishermen of a hundred years ago, pulling in codfish fast and furious, hitting each other with fish in their haste, because they had to catch all they could before the fist stopped biting. A wonderful book for a boy is: Kipling's
Captains Courageous. The Atlantic Monthly, vol. 80, issue 482 (December 1897). ...
http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/moa/browse.author/r.143.html
PS I got hooked by one typo. No mischievous intent. Just got away from me.Maybe I was thinking of the fishermen pulling them in "hand over fist."
> ...because they had to catch all they could before the fist stopped biting.
1. if this was purposeful, nice touch.
2. if this was a typo, touché.
...because they had to catch all they could before the fist stopped biting.This is, no doubt, a ref. to biting the hand that feeds you?
This from the Byrne site:
"Yes, you are absolutely correct. I bet you saw that and said, "Something is fishy here". Thanks for catching that mistake.
Sincerely,
Neil Churgin"
...Will let Mr. Churgin know that it was tsuwm who sniffed it out, not I, who wondered about such a strange word, but immediately added it to my whirling lexicon.
WW
"nobbled" - my earliest memory of hearing this word was my scouser ( native of Liverpool) grandad tearing up his betting slip as his selection trailed in last "THAT BLOODY HORSE HAS BEEN NOBBLED, SEND IT TO THE KNACKERS YARD'" the Knackers yard being where they killed old or crippled horses, giving rise to the expression "knackered" meaning useless or exhausted
the Duncster ( lethal bones)
Re: from Jackie
...because they had to catch all they could before the fist stopped biting.
This is, no doubt, a ref. to biting the hand that feeds you?since the fishermen (and crew) are catching the fish to eat, (and sell it to other to eat)
it this a case of
you, feeding the hands on what bites?
Re: from Jackie
...because they had to catch all they could before the fist stopped biting.
This is, no doubt, a ref. to biting the hand that feeds you?since the fishermen (and crew) are catching the fish to eat, (and sell it to other to eat)
isn't this a case of
you, feeding the hands on what bites?
WW says, "So the Byrne site is incorrect? I don't have her dictionary--just the site."
A suspicious lawyer might surmise that Dub-Dub possesses the dictionary but chose to mis-cite, it to stimulate discussion. His suspicion is allayed by noting that the dictionary's dust jacket includes a part of its text and prominantly displays the word hippopotomonstrosesquipedalian -- which Dub-Dub would have long since cited, had she seen it.
Post-edit, re response to hippopotomonstrosesquipedalian: my god, I've created a monster!
Dear Keiva,
You wrote: His suspicion is allayed by noting that the dictionary's dust jacket includes a part of its text and prominantly displays the word hippopotomonstrosesquipedalian...
Your suspicion is justly allayed because I would have added hippopotomonstrosesquipedalian to my legal use of such hippopotomonstrosesquipedalious words. Recently, I mentioned hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliaphobia and, what follows (with mincing feet) the hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliaphobe!
Rest assured, by your insightful deduction, I do not possess Mrs. Bryne's dictionary. Ordered it on Amazon, but they cancelled! They probably intuited the trouble it would cause here. The Byrne site was incorrect; they've acknowledged the mistake to me, thanks to contsuwm.
And I, for one, will incorrectly use cornobbled for the rest of my days. [Ducking for fear of flying fish here]
Best regards,
Hippopotamonstrosesquipedaliadubdub
hit by a fish?/hit by a fist?
Well, if a sailor or fisherman picks up a small flying fish from the deck, grips it in his fist, and then slugs you one...then it's like Candide, the best of all possible words! (or meanings) [having-your-cake-and-eating-it-too-e]
re:
the whole furshlugginer thing
It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide.
This is Mad®, do you hear me? Mad®!
... I've always speculated that "potrzebie" is really a Polish word, which would be pronounced something like "p'CHEB-ya" in the original and mean a rubber ball, or a bad check, or maybe even Tigger, or something else that bounces...
Any Polish-speakers listening who might comment? or am I just being too imaginative?
Cornobbled?
"It's the whole fishlugginer thing...You lug the high fish, and I'll lug the low fish..." from Loch Lomad
Alfred E. Seaman