A Hoosier says her friends tease her about the way she says doofitty when she can’t think of the right word for something. Grant and Martha discuss the long list of linguistic placeholders, including whatchamacallit, doodad, deely-bobber, doowanger, doojigger, doohickey, thingamabob, thingummy, thingum, and thingy. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Doofitty”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hi, this is Julie calling from Indianapolis, Indiana.
Julie, what are you calling us about today?
Well, I am calling about a word called dookity. My, I had used it about a year ago in an office area to reference someone whose name I couldn’t remember. Mm— and I got really, really strange looks from people in the office. And they Googled it, and they said, this is obviously a made-up word. I’m originally from southwestern Indiana. -huh. And I went back and queried my family because this is something my mom has always said. -huh. And they’ve all told me that it’s the word she made up.
Oh, really? And what is the word again?
Goofity.
How would you spell that?
I would say D-O-O-F-I-T-T-Y.
Doofity. And you would say this when you don’t remember somebody’s name then?
Correct.
Okay. I don’t think I’ve ever heard that before. I mean, I don’t want to alarm you or anything. You’re looking for a rescue here, aren’t you?
I am. I thought maybe it was just regional colloquialism because region, it’s an old coal mining area. And they have a very distinctive accent around there. They put Earl in their car and that sort of thing.
Earl, yeah. And flush the toilet? Do they flush the toilet?
Oh, yeah, you put the R in it because it gets it cleaner.
You put the R in the toilet to make it cleaner?
No, you put the R in wash to make it cleaner.
I never heard that. I never heard that. And they say doofity.
Grant, I’ve never heard that either. I’ve heard doohickey and deelibobber and thingamabob and whatchamacallit. I wrote an article about these kinds of terms once. I remember a bunch of them. Yeah, whatchamacallit, doodad. The Brits say doodah. There’s doowanger, dojigger, doohickey. And those are just the D ones. There’s also the T-U-H ones. Thingamabob and thingummy and thingam and thingy. And I know a few French ones, too.
Boy, I never come across that one before, Julia. I don’t know what to tell you. I bet she did make it up. And you know what? I’ll tell you this. All words were made up at some point, and it’s just fine.
Yeah, so you guys are ahead of the game.
Well, that’s good. We’ll try to spread it around and see if we can get it to catch on. Here’s the trick. When you use a word like that that you’re pretty sure that nobody else is going to know, just get a really superior look on your face. Kind of stick your nose up in the air, and you make them wonder. And if they ask questions, just give them a scornful look.
Sounds good. Well, Julie, I’m hoping that maybe some of our listeners will let us know if they’ve ever heard that word.
Well, that would be great. Yeah, yeah. So the question is still open then. You’ve still got a chance to prove it to your friends because maybe we’ll hear from somebody who also says the word doofity.
And is it blood related to me?
Right, right, right, exactly. Is it related to your family?
No, she said somebody who’s not blood related to her.
Somebody who’s not blood related to you.
Right.
All right. Well, thanks a lot for calling.
Well, thank you so much.
All right.
All right.
Bye-bye.
Bye-bye.
Bye.
Well, call Doofity and me at 1-877-929-9673. Or you can try us on the discussion forum at waywordradio.org. And you can always send us an email to words@waywordradio.org.
