Watussi, Cacooch, and Other Misfit Words

Last weekend we were eating at Chili’s, and I ordered the ribs. {I want my baby back, baby back, baby back, baby back, baby back, baby back…} Anyway, I was eating my very last rib, cleaning my plate like a good little Opto-Mom, and I felt something hard in my mouth. {Insert rude sexual comment here – I’m too tired to think of one.}  I had broken a damn tooth while eating ribs. It wasn’t like I was gnawing on the bone or anything, but a little piece of tooth had broken off, nonetheless.



So this prompted a visit to the dentist this week. Now, I adore my dentist. He is fabulous, and never hurts me, but I still hate going to the dentist!  It’s the piercing whine of the drills and the sucking of the spit vacuum that really grates on my nerves and makes me want to slap a puppy. So I asked for the nitrous oxide. Ahhhhh, sweet nectar of the Gods!


I swear I’m not a crackhead, but that nitrous shit is friggin’ awesome! I was totally chillaxin’ while he ground and drilled and made a mold for my new crown. Somehow the conversation got around to Japanese food, and my dentist said, “Oh, I love Japanese food, especially that watussi.”


“What the hell is watussi?” you may be asking. The doctor had his entire hand and about 14 instruments in my mouth, so it came out like, “Hut da heh if hapoofi?” when I asked. He said, “You know, that hot green stuff they serve with sushi.”

Watussi???

Oh.My.Gawd. The dental assistant and I just lost it! Of course, we realized that he was talking about wasabi. The assistant was laughing so hard that the little spit vacuum slipped out of my mouth and went up my left nostril. (My sinuses on the left side feel great now, by the way.) The assistant extracted the Hoover from my nose and said, “I think you mean ‘wasabi’.”


At this point, the dentist started cracking up too. I don’t know if it was the nitrous (aka, laughing gas) or just the whole “watussi” thing, but I couldn’t stop laughing. As soon as I would get myself under control, the dentist would start back to work. He would ask the assistant for something, and she would say, “Sure thing, Watussi!” Then we would all start giggling again.


This whole episode of the misfit word got me to thinking about my grandfather. He was the undefeated champ of the misfit word. No one could mangle the English language like my Papaw. Here are some examples of actual things my grandfather said (his words in red):


“Well, Stacy got bit by a spider. She had to go to the hospital because it was one of them brown cacooch spiders.” Now some people like to call this spider the brown recluse, but cacooch has such a nice ring to it.

Brown cacooch

“I’ve gotta go help John put up a gaboozo in his back yard.” It took about 15 minutes and a lot of hand gestures before we figured out that Papaw was talking about a gazebo. Yeah, I know.

Gaboozo

“We wanted a new Frigidaire refrigerator, but they had a nice Amanda one on sale.” He could pronounce Frigidaire, but not Amana?

Amanda refrigerator

“Jerry got a new watch that cost $2000! It was one of them Rolaids watches.” Jerry’s new watch is even better than a Rolex, because when you wear the Rolaids watch, you don’t get heartburn.

Rolaids watch

“Eric sold his Cadillac; said he just can’t afford the payments on that Escalator anymore.” Uhhhh, I got nothin’.

Cadillac Escalator

Another time, Papaw was arguing with his wife (Nanny) about a new sport he had heard of. She was cooking lunch, and he was sitting at the dining table with a newspaper. My dad walked in to hear him trying to explain “saucer,” a sport in which you kick a black and white ball around and try to score goals. Nanny kept saying, “Ray, you’re talking about soccer.” To which he would reply, “Now dammit, Mary, I know what soccer is. This is different. It’s saucer, spelled S-O-C-C-E-R. That’s saucer!”

Saucer

 Of course my dad just egged it on. “Yeah, I’ve heard of saucer. They play it a lot in Europe.” At this point, Nanny covertly poured arsenic in their drinks.

I swear, there’s never a dull moment with my family, though things just aren’t the same since we lost Papaw in 2001. We still have plenty of nuts, though. I’ll introduce you to more of them later.


Oh, and back to the dentist. The little masks that they hook up to the nitrous are scented – mine was tutti frutti. You get to keep your mask and bring it back to use the next time. When I got home I just laid it on the table (‘cuz that’s where all your shit goes, right?). So Manimus Maximus (my husband’s new nickname) gets home and points at the little pink mask on the table. “Why the hell is this on the table. You need to keep your little toys in the bedroom.” Here is a pic.

Smells like tutti frutti!  Yum!

I guess it does look kinda weird, huh? I told him to shut up and go get me some watussi.