Ewan Mellor  >  Neologisms

Neologisms

A "neologism" for my purposes is defined to be one which is found neither using Google nor Dictionary.com. The items in the square brackets are the coiner of the word, and the date of that coining.

pseudoephedreams (ˌsuːdəuˈefədriːms)

The restless sleep caused by strong cough medicine. [Ewan Mellor, 4 December, 2002]

ephedreams (ˈefədriːms)

Restless sleep caused by the really good stuff. By analogy with pseudoephedreams. [Ewan Mellor, 5 June, 2003]

yanko ('jænkəu)

A mistake (normally a bug in a computer program) caused by cut-and-pasting one piece of code elsewhere, and then not (completely) modifying the new code for its new purpose. Derived from the Emacs command "yank" meaning to paste previously copied material, and the word "typo", meaning a mistake caused by mistyping. [Ewan Mellor, 6 February, 2003, but actually a few years before that]

Near Misses

Here are words that I thought I had coined, but in fact have been used independently elsewhere.

fractalline

Fractal-like in form (cf. crystalline). Leafless trees are fractalline (and were the inspiration for the coining). Gets a few hits on Google, but nothing in the dictionaries.

enmired

The state of being mired in something. For example, "This is already an uncomfortable situation, and I do not wish to become further enmired." Again, gets a few hits on Google, but nothing in the dictionaries.