canderflabble
n.— «I once read an article about useful foreign words that had no English counterpart, and it mentioned some language (I forget which) that had a noun meaning “the state of two people each waiting to see if the other will volunteer to address an unpleasant situation that has recently arisen and could be handled by either but which neither wants to do.” If the English word for that was canderflabble, I’d say that my wife and I spend a good portion of our nights engaged in canderflabble.» —“Roundtable: New Fathers, Round II” by Matthew Baldwin The Morning News Nov. 22, 2004. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
A kerfuffle is a fuss, bother, or disturbance. It’s from Scots curfuffle, likely from Scottish Gaelic car, meaning “turn,” “bend,” or “twist,” plus fuffle, a Scots word that means “to disorder” or “to ruffle.” Early forms like carfuffle and...
Is there such a thing as a “neutral” accent, and if so what does it sound like? And that quirk in the way southern Californians talk about freeways. They’ll say things like take the 405 and get on the 8. Why the definite article...