Mere words

Gee, whiz. We haven’t even enjoyed Thanksgiving — and the frenzied dash into overcrowded shopping malls — and folks are already doing end-of-year stuff.

Like the eggheads at Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary, who have decided “bailout” is the word of the year.

Why? Because more people looked it up online than any other.

I demand a recount.

First of all, how can you be older than 12 and not know what “bailout” means?

Second, “bailout” is not even a particularly glamorous word. It’s just in the paper or on your newscast every five minutes, as in, “Another big Wall Street firm begged President-Elect Obama for a reallllly big bailout.”

The only good thing you can say about “bailout” is that it beat out even lamer words, like “trepidation,” “precipice” and “turmoil.”

(A gold star goes to the first commenter on this blog who uses all three in a sentence.)

What about “maverick” or “surge”? Now there are some words with some heft in ’08.

Last year’s choice of “truthiness” was superb. That, of course, came from Comedy Central Stephen Colbert.

The brainiacs at the New Oxford American Dictionary chose “hypermiling” as their word of the year.

That’s the practice of squeezing maximum MPGs out of your car’s gas tank with stunts like shutting off the engine to coast downhill.

I call such people “cheapskates” or “morons,” particularly if I'm driving behind them.

For his W.O.T.Y., wordsmith William Safire chose “frugalista,” which means someone who practices The New Frugality with flair.

Or what we used to call in the old days, “cheapskates.”

FEEDBACK: What’s your word of the year?