Poozley

Hi, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, how are you doing?

Hi, doing well. Who’s this?

This is Jeremy Greenberg, and I am calling from San Diego, California.

Well, welcome to the program, Jeremy. What’s on your mind?

The word poosley is on my mind.

My in-laws…

Wait a second, we have a seven-second dumper on this line.

The way they use it is to mean that they don’t feel well.

Never heard of it.

Can’t find it in a dictionary. They swear it’s a real word.

These are your in-laws, did you say?

Yeah, they’re of Welsh stock.

-huh.

And they say they feel poosily, and I think it’s impossible to feel poosily because it’s not a thing.

My wife says it, which is the main reason why I’m interested in potentially proving a wrong.

I see, yes.

And my mother-in-law says it.

And truthfully, I just want to know, is it a word?

Have you confronted them about this?

I have, and they defend that it is a word.

Okay. And can they cite other people having said this word?

They have not given me any instances of other people saying it, but they swear it’s a word.

So, Jeremy, are there degrees of poosley?

I mean, if you push back from Thanksgiving dinner and you’re really full, do you say, oh, I’m poosley?

Or is it more when you were in bed with a fever?

I think it’s the in bed with a fever.

They say that poosley is actually a combination of poor and queasy.

So, Jeremy, your theory is that this must be something that your family members made up.

I think my in-laws made it up, yes.

But it may have been so long ago that it’s just become a word.

I see.

I hope you don’t have very much on the line, Jeremy.

No, no, just wanting to know the truth more than anything.

The truth is, how shall I put this plainly?

You’re wrong.

I’m wrong?

You’re wrong, yes.

It is indeed a word.

It is a word.

It is a word.

And it has a variety of spellings.

In a variety of different places that I’ve seen it,

I can give you 20 or 30 different discrete users of it online.

It’s not a common word.

It’s not in any dictionary that I’ve checked.

And I don’t know that you’ll ever get anybody to agree on exactly where it comes from.

But there are many people who use it.

They spell it P-O-O-S-L-E-Y, P-O-O-Z-L-E-Y, P-O-O-Z-L-Y, P…

Even without the L, P-O-O-Z-Y.

Well, they’re going to be delighted.

And you’ll find it using it exactly in the way that you described it.

If you feel poosy or poosly, and it does seem to be how it’s pronounced, it means you feel poorly.

And I’d never heard the poorly plus queasy derivation.

I tend to doubt it, but it really does encapsulate the exact meaning.

It’s a combination of just feeling ill plus maybe a little nauseated.

Wow.

Jeremy, you’re saying that this is making you feel poosly?

This answer has made me feel quite poosly.

And, you know, in the United States, it’s not common at all.

But when I do see it, it tends to appear in New England, like Maine and Vermont.

Yeah.

And I don’t know about any Welsh descendancy there.

And I don’t know anything about this word coming from Welsh.

But that is a trail of evidence that I’m going to follow, just to see if I can figure this out.

Wow.

Well, Jeremy, we’re glad you called.

I’m not sure you’re glad you called.

No, but thanks for sharing this word with us in any case.

But a lot of our listeners will be delighted to find that, hey, I know that word.

My granny used that.

Or they’re going to start using it.

Oh, my God.

It’s going to be a poosie word.

Yeah, I’ll start using it.

I mean, really, it’s just fun.

And I’m glad to know it’s a real word.

Thank you for calling, Jeremy.

My pleasure.

Thank you.

All right.

Bye-bye.

Bye.

What’s really interesting from a lexical standpoint, the wide variety of spellings indicate that

This word is transmitted largely orally in English.

Yeah.

So that means it’s no wonder this poor man who is about to be pummeled by all of his in-laws, they’re going to get him back.

This poor man, there’s no wonder that he hasn’t encountered it before because if it’s transmitted orally, that means it’s pretty rare.

Poor Jeremy.

Bring to us your mysteries.

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