twazzock
n.— «All he can do is invite us to examine our responses to two statements: “Your son-in-law needs a loan,” versus “Your daughter’s boyfriend neads a loan.” According to Murray, “that’s the difference marriage makes.” What a twazzock. No wonder even Mrs Thatcher gave Murray short shrift when he first surfaced over here five years ago.» —“The Typically British Way Of Bastardy” by Francis Wheen Guardian (United Kingdom) May 25, 1994. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
It was a dark and stormy night. So begins the long and increasingly convoluted prose of Edwards Bulwer-Lytton’s best-known novel. Today the annual Bulwer-Lytton Contest asks contestants for fanciful first sentences that are similarly...
Old. Elderly. Senior. Why are we so uncomfortable when we talk about reaching a certain point in life? An 82-year-old seeks a more positive term to describe how she feels about her age. And: a linguist helps solve a famous kidnapping case, using the...