noun. Air travel by hot-air-balloon.

A sort of meditation on future airgonation, supposing that it will not only be perfected, but will depose navigation.
Letters, Horace Walpole (1784)

One who travels by hot-air-balloon is (also used by to Walpole) an airgonaut. Airgonauts airgonate just as astronauts astronate. Have you been astronating lately?

There’s probably not a whole lot of use for this word (airgonauts, please prove me wrong!) but it’ll be a fun one to pull out of your wordsack when next you go ballooning. What do people call themselves when they go in balloons as a hobby or for work? Ballooner, Balloonist, Balloonie, Bologna?

Don’t confuse hot air balloons with cold air balloons. One of those won’t get you very far. Horace Walpole says above that he thinks air travel will eventually replace sea travel. O, his prophetic soul! Do you think he could have predicted the internet’s vast supply of adult content? I think not.

noun. Being half in jest, half serious.

Our own poet has lately characterized himself as a jocoserious genius; and in fact this jocoseriosity seems of much the same quality with the eironeia of the Greek.
Browning Society Papers, E. Johnson (1885)

Comedians are well known for jocoseriosity: they’ll point out something ridiculous about our lives to make us laugh, as well as to make us think. I’m sure you speak with jocoseriosity all the time.

“Does this dress make me look fat?” she asked.
“Yeah, so huge!” he said with jocoseriosity.
He was swiftly incapacitated by a strong kick to the groinal region.

Don’t be that guy. Be jocoserious when appropriate, not on a seriosityful occasion. She wasn’t fat, just not as thin as she used to be.

Leave a comment full of jocoseriosity and jocoserious things you’ve said today!

adj. Risqué, indecent; also bizarre, unusual.

I can no longer endure this ostrobogulatory behaviour.
Ostrobogulous Pigs, A. Graves (1952)

Ostrobogulatory is derived from ostrobogulous, a word attributed to Victor Benjamin Neuburg, a British writer. According to him, the word meant “Full of rich dirt.” The uses of this word (and derivative forms) in the OED are flavouriferous and make me gumfiate with glee. Here’s my favorite.

‘Ostrobogulous’ was Vickybird’s favourite word. It stood for anything from the bawdy to the slightly off-colour. Any double entendre that might otherwise have escaped his audience was prefaced by, ‘if you will pardon the ostrobogulosity’.
A. Calder-Marshall (1951)

I’m going to preface most of my conversations now with, “If you will pardon the ostrobogulosity.” Or maybe I’ll add some graffiti to public restrooms saying “For an ostrobogulous time, please call…”

Have you had any ostrobogulatory experiences lately? Why not? You can’t get all the ostrobogularity you need from the internet, you know.

verb. To puff up, to swell.

The inflamed gout of polemical controversy..had gumfiated every mental joint and member of that zealous prop of the Relief Kirk.
The Ayrshire legatees, John Galt (1820)

I hit my shin with a piece of wood last weekend — it immediately gumfiated. The painful gumfiation lasted for a few days, but now it’s back to normal.

This word is related to conflate but they don’t see each-other except at reunions and thanksgiving.

This word’s mouthfeel makes me think that this term can be best used to describe swellings that are particularly gross. To swell sounds logical and pretty straightforward, but to gumfiate sounds so much worse. I attribute that to the “guh” sound. You know, the sound of something gross and swollen.

adj. Flowery and long-winded.

Much circumfloribus stuff was talked of on the Court side.
Autobiography, Mary Granville (1739)

The OED lists this word in particular as a “humorous nonce-word.” The others I’ve written about aren’t? A search reveals that according to the editors there are 55 humorous nonce words listed. The rest were decidedly unfunny. I happen to disagree with these editors, as many of the previous words I’ve listed are quite silly… but they make the big bucks working on the OED and I have this blog.

Perhaps I’m being a little long winded on this subject. Am I circumfloribus? No. I need to be flowery too.

A dozen roses! There.

I can think of a few fustian circumlocutary windbags whose conversation I might describe as circumfloribus. The majority of the thought-of circumfloribusters are in the world of politics. Coincidence? You decide.

adj. Rich in story.

This is..Some lone land of genii days, Storyful and golden!
Poems, The Lovely Land, James Clarence Mangan (1846)

I’m flabbergasted that this word hasn’t had more of a life to it. It turned up surprisingly few results on Google. Of all the words I’ve posted thus far, this might be the most usable. The meaning is undeniably apparent.

It’s not every that funny or silly of a word. Have I run out of them? Of course not. This word just appealed to me because it’s so user-friendly. The OED can say it’s a nonce word, I will tag it as such, but from now on it’s will be resurrected as a flavoriferous word to describe a really juicy tale.

Movies that have a great plot are storyful, your last family vacation is storyful, last night was probably storyful — I wish I could remember it.

Go out into the wild and tell your storyful stories! And if the squirrels aren’t interested go back to civilization and tell your storyful stories!

Oh boy have I got some storyful gossip for you. Did you hear about so-and-so doing such-and-such? Gross, right!?

noun. Boxing or fighting. (OED says “Pugilistic Performances.” They they go trying to sound all smart-like.)

I soon found my sisters, who were taken into a house during my pugnastics.
His reminiscences, Henry Angelo (1830)

No, it’s not a pug doing gymnastics. As entertaining as that would be (alas, YouTube returned no good results) that’s not what this word is about.

I’ve always been a fan of the word pugnacious, and I enjoy this word by association. Pugnacious people do pugnastics. Just as gymnacious people do gymnastics. You know, gymnacious… flexible. Makes sense, yeah?

Have you noticed that  I like to make up words? And they will all catch on in popular culture some day. And if you say otherwise, I might have to go pugnastic on your ass.

adj. Shiny or Glittery

Wood..Smooth, emicatious, free from knot or joint.
The Vestriad, Hans Busk (1819)

Are you easily distracted by emicatious objects? I sure am. Why, there’s one right over there…

…

Sorry. I was distracted.

I like the fancy sound this word has. It might be easier to say that I’m “distracted by a shiny object”, but to say that “my gaze was drawn upward to the welkin of emicatious orbs” is much more fustian, and therefore more enjoyable.

And now before I’m distracted by another shiny object, I think that this word is