New words for the dictionary

New words make their way into our language all the time. Each new edition of the Merriam Webster Dictionary contains few of them. <br/><br/>This time there are 100 new ones, and News on 6 reporter Rick

Wednesday, October 5th 2005, 10:51 am

By: News On 6

New words make their way into our language all the time. Each new edition of the Merriam Webster Dictionary contains few of them.

This time there are 100 new ones, and News on 6 reporter Rick Wells took a few of them to the Tulsa State Fair to see if folks know what they mean.

The News on 6 went to where people were this week, the Tulsa State Fair. Our first stop, the corner of Fire Escape and Fire Safety for an easy one, â€˜hazmat.â€™ "Its hazardous materials, hazmat's just for short to give it kind of an abbreviation." Excellent.

For our next new word, we headed to an ice cream vendor, â€˜brain freeze." "It's like that headache after you eat something very cold."

The new edition of the dictionary has 1,664 pages of words and terms and phrases. The next one we are looking for, we found someone in camouflage to ask, â€˜battle dress uniform.â€™ â€œLike going to war?â€ â€œTop bottom, boots, socks t-shirt and underwear sometimes." Sometimes, I didn't ask.

The next new entry is kind of tough, â€˜cybrarian.â€™ "Something in outer space." "Probably kind of like a librarian." Yes, a librarian in cyber space, managing info on the Internet.

Time for one more. Looking for the meaning of â€˜chick flick.â€™ For the record, our fair-goer said â€œbaaawwwk.â€ "Chick flick," is of course a movie intended to appeal to woman.

The Merriam-Webster editors have a list of about 17-million new entries under consideration. Every year only a very few actually make it into print.