😶 It Started, As Most Stories Do, With Procaffeinating
A glossary, a story, a poll, and 21 words you'll be using by the end of the day.
Hello, fabulous!
Okay so. First, I need to tell you about Kyan.
Kyan is my son Max’s best friend. He is young, he is hilarious, and a few months ago while visiting from college during Thanksgiving break, he casually dropped the word dartie into a conversation like it was nothing.
A dartie = a daytime party. I stopped everything. I made him repeat it. Then I immediately put on a note in my phone very creatively titled “word list”.
Then I couldn’t stop. He created a monster.
Every time I came across a word that made me cackle, or nod too hard, or grab someone’s arm and go “WAIT — do you know this one?” — I added it to the list. Words that should be in the dictionary but aren’t. Words that describe experiences we’ve all had but never had the vocabulary for. Words that feel like someone finally named the thing.
You know the thing. The experience you've had a hundred times but could only describe to your bestie with hand gestures and "okay, but you KNOW what I mean, right?" She knew. We all know. We just didn't have the word for it. Until now.
Today, that note has 21 words on it.
And today, my fabulous friends, is the day I get to share them with you. OMG, I’m so excited!!!
Before we get to the story, here are the words in all of their glory. Read them slowly. Savor them. Let them wash over you like a warm bath of linguistic excellence.
You're not ready. Go anyway.👇🏽
📚 Bibliogamy (n.) — A committed, loving, legally-binding-in-spirit union with one’s book collection. Partners are tolerated. The TBR pile is forever.
😤 Mantrum (n.) — The adult male tantrum. Identifiable by heavy sighing, cabinet-closing with just too much force, and the classic “I’m fine” delivered in a tone that means the opposite.
🎭 Testerical (adj.) — The male equivalent of hysterical. Notably, never called that.
💭 Hemotional (adj.) — Describing a man in the rare and delicate state of having emotions. Handle with care. Do not startle.
📅 Manstraul period (n.) — His monthly seven to ten days of inexplicable irritability, food cravings, and sensitivity. We don’t discuss it. We simply accommodate.
😇😈 Illuminaughty (adj.) — Spiritually woke, emotionally evolved, and still fully capable of chaos. The highest form of self-actualization.
💅 Ambitchous (adj.) — Relentlessly goal-oriented with zero intention of shrinking to make anyone comfortable. A compliment. Accept it.
🧹 Choreplay (n.) — The act of doing household tasks voluntarily and without being asked, which functions as the highest form of foreplay known to domestic life.
🍿 Snaccident (n.) — The phenomenon of consuming an entire snack with no conscious memory of beginning. The bag is empty. You are at peace.
☕ Procaffeinating (v.) — The biological inability to initiate any task, thought, or human interaction before coffee has been consumed. Protected under natural law.
✨ Glambush (n.) — The act of arriving somewhere looking so unexpectedly, devastatingly good that people physically pause. You didn’t warn them. That was intentional.
📱 Textpectation (n.) — The specific anxiety of waiting for a reply from someone who has very clearly read your message. We see the read receipt. We see it.
🥂 Resting brunch face (n.) — The natural expression of a person who looks perpetually ready for mimosas, eggs benedict, and a good story. A blessing, not a diagnosis.
🌍 Fomo-sapien (n.) — A member of the human species physically, spiritually, and constitutionally incapable of missing out on anything. Evolution did this.
😏 Snarkasm (n.) — The rare and beautiful fusion of snark and sarcasm. A gift. Not everyone can wield it. You probably can.
👑 Boujeification (n.) — The slow, inevitable, completely natural process of upgrading your taste level over time. You didn’t choose it. It chose you.
👻 Phantomposting (n.) — The act of composing an absolutely brilliant caption, tweet, or story entirely in your head and then never posting it. The internet’s loss. Truly.
💃 Glamxiety (n.) — The specific distress of looking incredible with absolutely nowhere to be. A tragedy of modern life.
🎃 Scrolloween (n.) — The horror of opening your phone for two minutes and emerging, blinking, two hours later with no memory of what happened.
☕ Dramacino (n.) — The performance art of ordering coffee. Extra oat milk. Specific temperature. A full monologue at the counter. We respect it.
✨ Glitterally (adv.) — Used for emphasis when something is simultaneously literal AND fabulous. As in: I am glitterally the most helpful person you know.
Of course, I did what any completely normal person would do and used all 21 words in a single story. This is either literary genius or a cry for help. Possibly both. Please hold your applause.👇🏽
It started, as most great stories do, with procaffeinating.
I was flat on the couch, eyes open, soul not yet present, waiting for the coffee to finish brewing so I could become a functional human being. My husband — bless him — was in the kitchen in the middle of a mantrum because we were out of his specific creamer. Cabinet. Closed. Too hard. Classic.
I said nothing. I have learned, after many years of marriage, that this was simply his manstraul period talking. He was hemotional — dangerously close to having actual feelings about the creamer situation — and the best thing I could do was wait it out like a tropical storm. You don’t argue with weather.
Once the coffee was ready I performed a full dramacino for myself, because if no one else was going to honor this moment, I was. Oat milk. Specific pour. A brief soliloquy to the mug. The audience of one gave myself a standing ovation.
Caffeinated and restored, I opened my phone — rookie mistake — and immediately fell into a scrolloween so deep I lost track of time, space, and three of my core personality traits. When I finally surfaced, blinking and slightly feral, forty-five minutes had passed and I had somehow agreed, via comment section, to attend four separate events this weekend.
Classic fomo-sapien behavior. I regret nothing. I regret everything.
I checked my messages and immediately felt the hot sting of textpectation — my best friend had very clearly read my paragraph-long message about whether we should go to brunch and had responded with absolutely nothing. Not a word. Not an emoji. Not even the courtesy of a lie. I typed and deleted a response seven times, which is peak phantomposting, and ultimately sent a single question mark.
She called me testerical when I brought it up later.
I was glitterally offended.
By noon I had pulled myself together enough to get dressed, which is when the glamxiety hit. I had chosen an outfit — capital O — and had nowhere to go. Nowhere. I looked like I was about to accept an award or board a yacht and my only plan was the grocery store. The boujeification of my personal style had officially outpaced my social calendar.
I went to the grocery store anyway. I wore the outfit. Two people complimented me and one woman asked if I was somebody. I said yes, without elaborating, and walked away. That is ambitchous energy and I will not apologize for it.
When I got home, my husband — now recovered from the mantrum, blessedly — had done the dishes, wiped the counters, AND started a load of laundry without being asked. Completely unprompted. I felt the choreplay in my soul. I looked at him like he had just handed me flowers on a random Tuesday. He had no idea why I was so moved. I didn’t explain. Some things are sacred.
I spent the afternoon in a state of illuminaughty bliss — I did my meditation, I said my affirmations, I set my intentions, and then I ate an entire sleeve of crackers standing over the sink with zero remorse. That was a snaccident and also a spiritual experience. The snarkasm I deployed when my inner critic tried to comment about it was so swift and so precise that she hasn’t spoken since.
By evening I was deep in my bibliogamy, curled up with my current book like it was my person, completely unavailable to the world. My husband tried to tell me something. I heard none of it. The book and I were in a committed relationship and interruptions were not welcome.
He gave me resting brunch face from across the room — that look of someone who is perpetually unbothered and vaguely ready for a good time regardless of circumstance — and I matched it right back.
We sat in comfortable, glitterally golden silence.
And that, my friends, was a completely ordinary Tuesday.
There you have it. Twenty one words to carry you through this life with more accuracy, more humor, and significantly more flair.
The word fairy, aka me, has done her work. You’re welcome, fabulous people. I’ll accept your applause now. 🧚♀️✨
Okay I need to know — which word on this list made you go "WAIT ✋🏽" out loud?
The list doesn't stop here. If you've got a word that should absolutely be on it, put it in the comments. I'm taking notes. Literally. I have a note in my phone. 😂
Look, I don’t like to brag. (That’s a lie. I love to brag.) Here are some older posts that made me laugh out loud when I reread them. Try not to be too impressed.
If this made you snort, cackle, or immediately text someone the word choreplay — first of all, same. Second of all, share this with a friend who deserves it. You know exactly who. The one currently surviving a someone’s manstraul period, deep in a scrolloween spiral, or walking around in a full glambush with nowhere to be.
The world needs these words. Be the one who delivers them.
Until next time — stay illuminaughty, stay ambitchous, and for the love of everything holy, do not open your phone after 9pm.
You know what happens.
LET'S DISCUSS 💬: Okay I need to know — which word on this list made you go "WAIT ✋🏽" out loud?
The list doesn't stop here. If you've got a word that should absolutely be on it, put it in the comments. I'm taking notes. Literally. I have a note in my phone. 😂
I'm in love with Testerical. Never have I ever heard a more cuttingly perfect word for male drama 🤣 This list is brilliant.