Don’t you find it annoying when you can’t think of the name of a person or an object? If it’s an object, you find yourself searching for the right word, maybe even saying, “How would you say…?” or “What do you call…?”.
Well, search no more – here are a series of expressions that can be slotted in to your sentences to keep your speech flowing.
Please note, spellings are rather on the phonetic side.
For objects:
A whatsit – a contraction of ‘what is it’
For ex: Where did I put the whatsit I just brought in?
A whats-its-name
For ex: I’ve lost my whats-its-name!
On the same theme, you can also use these mini phrases to describe something:
A whats-ya-ma-call-it
And more common in the US:
A watcha ma call it
For ex: I need a new whats-ya-ma-call-it for my car, it’s going to cost a fortune.
There is also a little series built around the word ‘thing’; some of these have rather humorous endings:
A thing-ma-jig also said as a thing-ma-jigger
A thingy-ma-bob
For ex: Can you bring me that thingy-ma-bob over there?
There is an even stranger series built around the sound ‘oojah’ which I believe is probably a contraction of ‘who is your’ which has become ‘whosya’ as in, “Who is your friend?” which in colloquial speech becomes “Whosya friend?”
This has migrated into:
An-oojah-ma-thingy
An-oojah-ma-bob
For ex: I’m just going out to buy some, erhh… oojah-ma-thingis for the cake I’m baking.
If all these expressions don’t slip off your tongue easily, then you could just plump for the simple word ‘doobery’.
A doobery – a brilliant word that can replace any noun.
For ex: Pass the doobery, please!
I left my doobery at home.
Could you get that doobery out of the way?
What if you want to refer to someone but you’ve forgotten his or her name. Then colloquial English comes to the rescue with a similar series. These are best used when the person you are talking about is not present!
what’s-his-face or what’s-her-face
For ex: When are you going to introduce me to what’s-his-face?
What’s-his-name or what’s-her-name
For ex: I just had lunch with what’s-her-name from the marketing department.
Parents wanting to refer to their young offspring without naming them, might be heard using ‘you-know-who’ or ‘a-certain-somebody’.
You-know-who
For ex: I think it’s time we put you-know-who to bed.
Or when you don’t want to name a person in front of a child, you might say:
For ex: You-know-who is coming round this evening for a drink.
A-certain-somebody
For ex: I think a-certain-somebody has had quite enough biscuits for now!
So next time you’re searching for your words, fall back on one of the above.
If you know of any others, please share them with us.
Photo credit: California Bakery via photopin cc
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