Say You’re Tired the Scottish Way!
Ramfeezled: Exhausted / Fatigued
It’s been a tough day; I’m ramfeezled!
With it being just over two weeks since the new year, perhaps I’m late in covering the word ramfeezled, as the OED credits Scottish poet Robert Burns (perhaps most famous for being the author of Auld Lang Syne, which most people associate with New Year’s Eve) with a 1785 use of the word. In my copy of the OED, the word is (I believe) one of the “subordinate” entries, which seems to be a mysterious status of words reserved for those considered obsolete, doubtful, or alleged. (Though, perhaps not so doubtful or alleged as to exclude them from the OED.)
In his Second Epistle to J. Lapraik, Burns writes:
The tapetless, ramfeezl’d hizzie
She’s saft at best an’ something lazy:
Quo’ she, “Ye ken we’ve been sae busy
This month an’ mair,
That trowth, my head is grown right dizzie,
An’ something sair.”
(You can find the full text here.)
In any case, as can be seen, the hizzie in the poem has been busy for more than a month and, dammit, she’s downright exhausted!
I kind of like the word hizzie, as well; there’s something both Renaissancey and Snoop Doggy about it.
So, there you go; you get a two-fer today!
Word Score: 7/ 10: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
I give it a seven. It’s a very good, but perhaps not quite great word, if only because it’d probably be tough to convincingly incorporate into something new (not that I advise against using it). Hell, use it until you’re ramfeezled yourself.
