This is a dismissive phrase roughly equivalent to ‘not my problem’. The speaker says that the situation, whatever it is, is not their responsibility.
ZG: 6
I think this amusing expression is picking up in frequency.
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Sometimes in the online world there are sites which will ban any texts that use the words kill or suicide. If you want to discuss topics that relate to killing or suicide you need to avoid the actual words and substitute a euphemism. Unalive has come to fill this role.
ZG: 6
It is in the expanding chat on social media that this code becomes relevant. See algospeak.
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This is a term used as a put-down for someone who fulfils a technical requirement to claim Aboriginality without any authentic engagement with Aboriginal culture. Other terms are JCL (Johnny Come Lately) and DNA Aboriginal.
ZG: 2
Even in the Indigenous community I think this expression is confined to those who are more politically engaged.
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It is always the way with recreational drugs that are illegal that they acquire a number of slang names. After all, you don’t want to shout out ‘I’m doing cocaine tonight’. Much better to announce that you are having a couple of nose beers.
ZG: 7
A colloquialism that seems fairly popular.
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I had to wade through a certain amount of tiger stripe cocktails online in order to find tiger-striping but Google and I got there eventually. This tiger striping is the practice of alternating an alcoholic drink with a non-alcoholic drink.
ZG: 6
There is something quirky about this coinage which means it is likely to catch on.
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In gaming an NPC is a non-playable character in the game, one that the players cannot control. It was originally controlled by the gamemaster or referee, and then later the computer. So to be called an NPC in real life is an insult.
ZG: 6
The word has certainly spread beyond the gaming world but it is still niche.
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The phrase in one’s wheelhouse caught my attention. Believe it or not, it was used by a toponymist (an expert in placenames) considering the street name Nowhere Else Road. It’s on the Eyre Peninsula. Despite this being in his field of expertise, he remained none the wiser as to the origin of the name.
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The children sized up their teacher in her bright orange pants and sunflower-patterned top. ‘That looks weird’ said one. ‘Na, she’s drip!’ said another. A couple more nodded sagaciously in agreement. The teacher was nonplussed.
ZG: 6
I would imagine that this one is catching on quickly with the younger generation.
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In Australia this expression surfaced in the reality TV show, The Challenge. Late 2022 there was a ride-or-die series in which contestants were invited to bring their choice of partner along with them as support, their own particular ride-or-die rather than a partner chosen for them by the producers of the show.
ZG: 4
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The expression You really slay me! dates back to American English of the 1920s so it is fairly traditional slang these days. You might even seem a bit quaint if you used it. But there is a new way in which slay is being used adjectivally, as in He is so slay! That movie was slay! Or as an interjection. What do you think of the movie? Slay!
ZG: 5
As with all such slang it has huge currency in a particular group.
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I had thought that we had written all there was to say at the entry for fuck in the Macquarie Dictionary after many rewrites and revisions, but no — there is more.
ZG: 7
A popular bit of slang at the moment, probably one that will incur disapproval from the older generation.
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Do you have rizz? If you have to think about it then you probably don’t. Rizz is the ability to attract someone of the opposite sex by being able to flatter, tease, produce attention-engaging word play. Rizz is not exactly smooth-talking. It is more like a verbal display that pulls the girl in.
ZG: 7
This one seems to have gained currency very quickly among the Twitterers and in real life.
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This phrase comes from the netiverse and was originally directed at people who were thought to have spent too much time online (and it was showing). They were therefore advised to go outside into the real world and touch some grass to reconnect.
ZG: 6
For those of us engaged in chat online or in the Twitterverse, this is an accepted expression.
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To make bank is to make a lot of money, more than is needed to just cover the essentials. It gives you riches to play with.
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You probably feel that the Word of the Year is done and dusted, but there is one more contribution to discuss. This is from the American Dialect Society who started the whole idea of Word of the Year in 1990. Their Word of the Year for 2022 was the suffix -ussy.
ZG: 2
This word play is in a way designed to be a badge of pride for a minority in the community so it will never be mainstream. Perhaps I shouldn’t say ‘never’.
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It was another outbreak in Melbourne in late May that introduced us to the new names for the COVID-19 variants of concern. Apparently India had complained to the WHO about the way in which the world was talking about the Indian variant and so the WHO responded by renaming the lot.
ZG: 8
The people of Melbourne will have delta and kappa engraved on their hearts at the moment. I imagine we have yet to make a few more moves through the Greek alphabet before this is done.
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Now we have lawn porn. This is the parade of photos posted on a Facebook page called Lawn Porn so that people, mostly young blokes, can show off their perfect lawns and swap ideas and advice to help others achieve the same spectacular results.
ZG: 5
Most of us are attempting to reduce our lawns to the minimum so this could be described as a niche activity.
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This is a coinage to describe the activities of DJs who are live streaming. It has been observed that they commonly choose to have in the background a plant and a lava lamp. Thus the blend plamp.
ZG: 5
This is limited to those who are enjoying the various livestream offerings but they will certainly need a special word like this as a marker of their participation in a new iso way of enjoying music.
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Zoom is an app that facilitates online meetings, chats and group messaging. It was popular in the business and education world, but now that we are all living virtual lives, Zoom has become a popular app for any kind of virtual engagement with other people.
ZG: 6
While it is true that we are becoming much more familiar with ways of connecting online than we had ever thought possible, it is also true that, when this is over, we will want to meet in person more than ever.
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