CAMER (n.)
A mis-tossed caber.
CANNOCK CHASE (n.)
In any box of After Eight Mints, there is always a large number of empty envelopes and no more that four or five actual mints. The cannock chase is the process by which, no matter which part of the box often, you will always extract most of the empty sachets before pinning down an actual minot, or ‘cannock’. The cannock chase also occurs with people who put their dead matches back in the matchbox, and then embarrass themselves at parties trying to light cigarettes with tree quarters of an inch of charcoal. The term is also used to describe futile attempts to pursue unscrupulous advertising agencies who nick your ideas to sell chocolates with.
CHENIES (pl.n.)
The last few sprigs or tassels of last Christmas’s decoration you notice on the ceiling while lying on the sofa on an August afternoon.
CHICAGO (n.)
The foul-smelling wind which precedes an underground railway train.
CHIPPING ONGAR (n.)
The disgust and embarrassment (or ‘ongar’) felt by an observer in the presence of a person festooned with kirbies (q.v.) when they don’t know them well enough to tell them to wipe them off, invariably this ‘ongar’ is accompanied by an involuntary staccato twitching of the leg (or ‘chipping’)
CLABBY (adj.)
A ‘clabby’ conversation is one stuck up by a commissionaire or cleaning lady in order to avoid any further actual work. The opening gambit is usually designed to provoke the maximum confusion, and therefore the longest possible clabby conversation. It is vitally important to learn the correct, or ‘clixby’ (q.v.), responses to a clabby gambit, and not to get trapped by a ‘ditherington’ (q.v.). For instance, if confronted with a clabby gambit such as ‘Oh, mr Smith, I didn’t know you’d had your leg off’, the ditherington response is ‘I haven’t….’ whereas the clixby is ‘good.’
CLACKAVOID (n.)
Technical BBC term for a page of dialogue from Blake’s Seven.
CLACKMANNAN (n.)
The sound made by knocking over an elephant’s-foot umbrella stand full of walking sticks. Hence name for a particular kind of disco drum riff.
CLATHY (adj.)
Nervously indecisive about how safely to dispose of a dud lightbulb.
CLENCHWARTON (n. archaic)
One who assists an exorcist by squeezing whichever part of the possessed the exorcist deems useful.
CLIXBY (adj.)
Politely rude. Briskly vague. Firmly uninformative.
CLONMULT (n.)
A yellow ooze usually found near secretions of buldoo (q.v.) and sadberge (q.v.)
CLOVIS (q.v.)
One who actually looks forward to putting up the Christmas decorations in the office.
CLUN (n.)
A leg which has gone to sleep and has to be hauled around after you.
CLUNES (pl.n.)
People who just won’t go.
CONDOVER (n.)
One who is employed to stand about all day browsing through the magazine racks in the newsagent.
CONG (n.)
Strange-shaped metal utensil found at the back of the saucepan cupboard. Many authorities believe that congs provide conclusive proof of the existence of a now extinct form of yellow vegetable which the Victorians used to boil mercilessly.
CORFE (n.)
An object which is almost totally indistinguishable from a newspaper, the one crucial difference being tat it belongs to somebody else and is unaccountably much more interesting that your own – which may otherwise appear to be in all respects identical. Though it is a rule of life that a train or other public place may contain any number of corfes but only one newspaper, it is quite possible to transform your own perfectly ordinary newspaper into a corfe by the simple expedient of letting somebody else read it.
CORFU (n.)
The dullest person you met during the course of your holiday. Also the only one who failed to understand that the exchanging of addresses at the end of a holiday is merely a social ritual and is absolutely not an invitation to phone you up and turn up unannounced on your doorstep three months later.
CORRIEARKLET (n.)
The moment at which two people approaching from opposite ends of a long passageway, recognise each other and immediately pretend they haven’t. This is to avoid the ghastly embarrassment of having to continue recognising each other the whole length of the corridor.
CORRIECRAVIE (n.)
To avert the horrors of corrievorrie (q.v.) corriecravie is usually employed. This is the cowardly but highly skilled process by which both protagonists continue to approach while keeping up the pretence that they haven’t noticed each other – by staring furiously at their feet, grimacing into a notebook, or studying the walls closely as if in a mood of deep irritation.