The Meaning of Liff Read online

  ULLAPOOL (n.)

  The spittle which builds up on the floor of the Royal Opera House.

  ULLINGSWICK (n.)

  An over-developed epiglottis found in middle-aged coloraturas.

  ULLOCK (n.)

  The correct name for either of the deaf Scandinavian tourists who are standing two abreast in front of you on the escalator.

  UMBERLEIGH (n.)

  The awful moment which follows a dorchester (q.v.) when a speaker weighs up whether to repeat an amusing remark after nobody laughed the last time. To be on the horns of an umberleigh is to wonder whether people didn't hear the remark, or whether they did hear it and just didn't think it was funny, which was why somebody coughed.

  UPOTTERY (n.)

  That part of a kitchen cupboard which contains an unnecessarily large number of milk jugs.

  UTTOXETER (n.)

  A small but immensely complex mechanical device which is essentially the 'brain' of a modern coffee vending machine, and which enables the machine to take its own decisions.

  VALLETTA (n.)

  On ornate head-dress or loose garment worn by a person in the belief that it renders then invisibly native and not like a tourist at all. People who don huge colonial straw collie hats with 'I Luv Lagos' on them in Nigeria, or fat solicitors from Tonbridge on holiday in Malaya who insist on appearing in the hotel lobby wearing a sarong know what we're on about.

  VANCOUVER (n.)

  The technical name for one of those huge trucks with whirling brushes on the bottom used to clean streets.

  VENTNOR (n.)

  One who, having been visited as a child by a mysterious gypsy lady, is gifted with the strange power of being able to operate the air-nozzles above aeroplane seats.

  VIRGINSTOW (n.)

  A Durex machine which doesn't have the phrase 'So was the Titanic' scrawled on it. The word has now fallen into disuse.

  VOBSTER (n.)

  A strain of perfectly healthy rodent which develops cancer the moment it enter a laboratory.

  WARLEGGAN (n. archaic)

  One who does not approve of araglins (q.v.)

  WATH (n.)

  The rage of Roy Jenkins.

  WEEM (n.)

  The tools with which a dentist can inflict the greatest pain. Formerly, which tool this was dependent upon the imagination and skill of the individual dentist, though now, with technological advances, weems can be bought specially.

  WEMBLEY (n.)

  The hideous moment of confirmation that the disaster presaged in the ely (q.v.) has actually struck.

  WENDENS AMBO (n.)

  (Veterinary term.) The operation to trace an object swallowed by a cow through all its seven stomachs. Hence, also (1) en expedition to discover where the exits are in the Barican Centre, and (2) a search through the complete works of Chaucer for all the rude bits.

  WEST WITTERING (participial vb.)

  The uncontrollable twitching which breaks out when you're trying to get away from the most boring person at a party.

  WETWANG (n.)

  A moist penis.

  WHAPLODE DROVE (n.)

  A homicidal golf stroke.

  WHASSET (n.)

  A business car in you wallet belonging to someone whom you have no recollection of meeting.

  WHISSENDINE (n.)

  The nose which occurs (often by night) in a strange house, which is too short and too irregular for you ever to be able to find out what it is and where it comes from.

  WIDDICOMBE (n.)

  The sort of person who impersonates trim phones.

  WIGAN (n.)

  If, when talking to someone you know has only one leg, you're trying to treat then perfectly casually and normally, but find to your horror that your conversion is liberally studded with references to (a) Long John Silver, (b) Hopalong Cassidy, (c) The Hockey Cokey, (d) 'putting your foot in it', (e) 'the last leg of the UEFA competition', you are said to have committed a wigan. The word is derived from the fact that sub-editors at ITN used to manage to mention the name of either the town Wigan, or Lord Wigg, in every fourth script that Reginald Bosanquet was given to read.

  WIKE (vb.)

  To rip a piece of sticky plaster off your skin as fast as possible in the hope that it will (a) show how brave you are, and (b) not hurt.

  WILLIMANTIC (adj.)

  Of a person whose hearth is in the wrong place (i.e. between their legs).

  WIMBLEDON (n.)

  That last drop which, no matter how much you shake it, always goes down your trouser leg.

  WINKLEY (n.)

  A lost object which turns up immediately you've gone and bought a replacement for it.

  WINSTON-SALEM (n.)

  A person in a restaurant who suggest to their companions that they should split the cost of the meal equally, and then orders two packets of cigarettes on the bill.

  WIVENHOE (n.)

  The cry of alacrity with which a sprightly eighty-year-old breaks the ice on the lake when going for a swim on Christmas Eve.

  WOKING (participial vb.)

  Standing in the kitchen wondering what you came in here for.

  WOOLFARDISHWORTHY (n.)

  A mumbled, mispronounced or misheard word in a song, speech or play. Derived from the well-known mumbles passage in Hamlet :

  '...and the spurns,

  That patient merit of the unworthy takes

  When he himself might his quietus make

  With a bare bodkin? Who woolfardisworthy

  To grunt and sweat under a weary life?'

  WORGRET (n.)

  A kind of poltergeist which specialises in stealing new copies of the A-Z from your car.

  WORKSOP (n.)

  A person who never actually gets round to doing anything because he spends all his time writing out lists headed 'Things to Do (Urgent)'.

  WORMELOW TUMP (n.)

  Any seventeen-year-old who doesn't know about anything at all in the world other than bicycle gears.

  WRABNESS (n.)

  The feeling after having tried to dry oneself with a damp towel.

  WRITTLE (vb.)

  Of a steel ball, to settle into a hole.

  WROOT (n.)

  A short little berk who thinks that by pulling on his pipe and gazing shrewdly at you he will give the impression that he is infinitely wise and 5 ft 11 in.

  WYOMING (participial vb.)

  Moving in hurried desperation from one cubicle to another in a public lavatory trying to find one which has a lock on the door, a seat on the bowl and no brown steaks on the seat.

  YADDLETHORPE (vb.)

  (Of offended pooves.) To exit huffily from a boutique.

  YARMOUTH (vb.)

  To shout at foreigners in the belief that the louder you speak, the better they'll understand you.

  YATE (n.)

  Dishearteningly white piece of bread which sits limply in a pop-up toaster during a protracted throcking (q.v.) session.

  YEPPOON (n.)

  One of the hat-hanging corks which Australians wear for making Qantas commercials.

  YESNABY (n.)

  A 'yes, maybe' which means 'no'.

  YONDER BOGINE (n.)

  The kind of restaurant advertised as 'just three minutes from this cinema' which clearly nobody ever goes to and, even if they had ever contemplated it, have certainly changed their mind since seeing the advert.

  YONKERS (n.)

  (Rare.) The combined thrill of pain and shame when being caught in public plucking your nostril-hairs and stuffing them into your side-pocket.

  YORK (vb.)

  To shift the position of the shoulder straps on a heavy bag or rucksack in a vain attempt to make it seem lighter. Hence : to laugh falsely and heartily at an unfunny remark. 'Jasmine yorked politely, loathing him to the depths of her being' - Virginia Woolf.

  ZEAL MONACHORUM (n.)

  (Skiing term.) To ski with 'zeal monachorum' is to descend the top three quarters of the mountain in a quivering blue funk, but on arriving a
t the gentle bit just in front of the restaurant to whizz to a stop like a victorious slalom-champion.

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  Douglas Adams, The Meaning of Liff

 

 

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