It's about as crazy as Esperanto

I believe that every family has a language. And I don't mean something deep, like a sub-level to every conversation, through which run undercurrents of resentment and latent rage. I literally mean a language, like pig Latin. At the very least, every family has a vocabulary. 

Inspired by one of emlocke's recent posts, in which she describes what her mother means when she says, "Love your guts," I made a list of the strange vocabulary we use around here. In no particular order:

zap: n. A shoe, but specifically, a sandal or flip-flop worn around the house. Origin: A bastardization of the Vietnamese word for sandal, spelled "dep" but pronounced "zap." Usage: "Have you seen my zaps?"

sleepy: n. A state of being inclined toward sleep. Origin: My husband. Usage: "I lost my sleepy, so I got up and blogged."

first awake: n. The block of time (usually spanning 7 a.m. to 8:30 a.m.) when boy has arisen in the morning but preceding his first nap of the day. Origin: Self-explanatory. Usage: "I'm too tired to shower tonight. Will you watch boy during first awake so I can shower then?"

ai bao (pronounced "EYE bah-oh"): [Incomplete phrase, therefore not any particular part of speech] Roughly translates to, "Who told you to ..." and therefore needs an object to complete the phrase. Origin: Vietnamese. Usage: "Bumped your head pretty hard, huh? Ai bao crawl under the coffee table and then try to sit up?"

fluppus: n. The tag sewn into the back of the neckline of shirts, indicating size and manufacturer. Origin: My mother's neighbors growing up coined this phrase. Usage: "Hold on, your fluppus is showing -- let me tuck it in."

churdle (rhymes with "turtle"): n. An adorable baby, usually one with pleasingly plump proportions or one who has just made a face or noise that is appealing or at least amusing. Origin: My husband. Usage: "Did you see boy just wrinkle his nose at you?! He's SUCH a churdle."

weegle (pronounced "WEE-juhl"): n. An adorable baby, but one who seems to be kind of a rascal in the making. Usually used after the baby in question has made a cute squinchy face. Origin: My sister- and brother-in-law created this one. Usage: "Ooooh, I'm gonna pinch those chubby cheeks, you weegle!"

fartle: n. The tiny smear of baby poo in a diaper that was thought to contain a much more impressive amount of poo (though a fartle can also surprise the changer, who did not suspect the appearance of any solid matter at all). Origin: A play on the word, "fart." Usage: "Let's change your diap -- whoops, pass me the wipes, there's a fartle here." (Editor's note: In other families of our acquaintance, the usage of the words "shart" and "shartlette" have also been identified to mean the same thing. These words have their basic origin in a movie called "Along Came Polly" starring Jennifer Aniston, Ben Stiller and Philip Seymour Hoffman, in which the Hoffman character must leave a social gathering because he has "sharted" in his shorts -- thought he was going to fart but passed more substance instead. The fact that I am explaining this baffles me to no end.)

choss (rhymes with "gross" but pronounced more quickly): n. A silent fart. Origin: Persian. Usage: "Dude, did you just choss? I didn't hear anything but it's killing me, dude. What did you eat? Are you alright? MAN."

gooze (rhymes with "ooze"): n. An audible fart. Origin: Persian. Usage: "Don't even blame that gooze on me. I heard you cut that one." (Editor's note: I live with two boys. Is there any wonder our personal family vocabulary places so much emphasis on the products of one's excretory system?)