Scrumpets, Butches & Kill-Blocks

RWT is somewhat famous for his made-up words and terms. Some are said purposely, others are inadvertent. One of his most notable: Butches. You know, those vanilla cookies with a cinnamon-sugar coating that are more commonly called Snickerdoodles. They just happen to be RWT’s favorite cookies, but he absolutely refuses to say such a silly word as “Snickerdoodles”. Hence, the term “Butches” was born. And it has become widespread among our family, even though upon hearing it, my niece immediately questioned her uncle’s authority to unilaterally change the name of cookies.

When my aunt visited a few years ago, she made us munker which are regional Norwegian spherical pancakes (similar to Swedish aebleskiver) that she learned to cook from her mother-in-law. Well, RWT didn’t like that name either, so Scrumpets was born, which is a combination of scrumptious and crumpets (not that he’s eaten a crumpet in his life).

Galoop is another RWT-ism. “Don’t be such a big galoop”. He says it just sounds more appropriate than “galoot”. The same goes for Swarmy (aka smarmy).

Not satisfied with the ones out of his own brain, RWT also collects malapropisms. The best two he heard within mere months of each other when we where stationed in Twentynine Palms. He was at a meeting discussing the landscaping options for around the various buildings on the base and someone brought up xeriscaping (using drought-resistant plants and alternate materials to cut down on water usage). But they did not say it as such… the person said “Zero-scaping”. RWT asked “zero?” and the reply was “Yes, it uses almost zero water”. Perhaps it was all Greek to them.

We laugh about the other term from Twentynine Palms quite frequently because it is such a part of life on military bases and around this area. It has to do with the barriers utilized as anti-terrorist protection to prevent car-bombings of buildings, gates and other valuable assets. Unlike the Air Force that can afford the attractive faux-brick-faced concrete barriers or the huge, decorative planters seen around the White House and Capitol, most Navy bases make do with old blocks of concrete that were initially used to keep ships upright while they are in dry dock. The blocks are large & heavy and have a handy-dandy loop built in to the top to facilitate moving them with a crane (but why the Navy seems to have an inexhaustible supply of them is a mystery). What they should be called are “keel-blocks” since they are put under a ship’s keel (the spine along the bottom). What the Marines called them… Kill-Blocks. Obviously, it is all a matter of one’s perspective.

My favorite RWT-ism of all is Invalint. Where he came up with this one is beyond me, but it has become very appropriate since the table saw accident because, for the time being, RWT is an invalint (although others are more apt to say “invalid”). But what makes this one even better is that RWT's injured hand had been in a permanent splint wrapped in beige cotton gauze (and it bears a striking resemblance to Sheri Lewis’ puppet Lambchop). Well, that cotton gauze tends to leave fuzz all over everything. And (you can see where this is going, can’t you?) we decided the best term for that fuzz… yes, invalint.