Customer Reviews

Sniglets (Snig'lit : Any Word That Doesn't Appear in the Dictionary, But Should)

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I first remember hearing about Sniglets from Rich Hall on TV. I think he was doing guest spots on David Letterman's daytime show back in the early 1980s. "Sniglets" are basically words that don't appear in the dictionary but should. Rich Hall has compiled an entire book of these, and they've provided me with a lot of humor over the years.

Believe it or not, at the classical Christian school at which I teach, I have one of the students write the Sniglet for the day on the board. I've also had students try to come up with their own Sniglets, and then I let them write them on the board (if they're any good).

A few good examples of Sniglets are the following: Bleemus (blee' mus) - n. The disgusting film on the top of soups and cocoa that sit out for too long.

Blithwapping - v. Using anything BUT a hammer to hammer a nail into the wall, such as shoes, lamp bases, doorstops, etc.

Doork (dawrk) - n. A person who always pushes on a door marked "pull" or vice versa.

Hozone (ho' zohn) - n. The place where one sock in every laundry load disappears to.

My favorite use of a Sniglet word came just a week or two ago. The class had seen the word "spratchet" on the board, which is the made up name for the piece of plastic that's used to divide one shopper's items from another in a grocery store. I kept telling my high school class that we ought to all begin using the word "spratchet" and see if it catches on. I'm not sure if any of them ever took my suggestion. But a week or two ago I was in WalMart with my son when I dared him to ask the woman in front of us to please pass the spratchet. He wrestled with the idea for more than a minute and finally mustered up the nerve (after some prodding from me).

He calmly pointed to the spratchet and said to the woman, "Would you please pass the spratchet?" Without missing a beat, she calmly passed the spratchet. Maybe she was just being friendly and maybe she was just too embarrassed to admit that she didn't know those things were called spratchets.

This is only one example of the practical fun you can have with Sniglets, in addition to simply reading them and passing them around with your friends. Sniglets is highly recommended for group reading. Try it!

If you enjoy them, there are a couple of follow up books as well.

Fast delivery to a friend I bought it for. They seem to enjoy it.

These were ingenious and creative words that you could really relate to. Very good for a quick funny read during down time.

Remember these? They were the highlight of one of the 80's most subversive shows, HBO's "Not Necessarily the News". THey're words that should be around, but aren't.

Some are mortifying stupid. I think all the Aqua Net used to make that big 80's hair seeped into people's brains. I like some of them, and they were enough to justify my buying the book, so there you go.