Vote for the best verboticism.
DEFINITION: v., To search for and find a pen to write down an important note, only to discover that the pen does not work. n., A moment in time when the only pens you can find, are pens that do not work.
Verboticisms
Click on each verboticism to read the sentences created by the Verbotomy writers, and to see your voting options...
You have two votes. Click on the words to read the details, then vote your favorite.
Inkompentense
Created by: Nosila
Pronunciation: ink kom pen tens
Sentence: Inkredibly inkonvenient is what he thought. Here he was trying to find a pen that worked to write down the number given him on the phone message he had just accidentally erased from his answering machine...while that number was still in his head. His inklination was to give up, but it would be inkonsiderate to not call back and arrange that interview. Heaven knows his inkome relied upon his getting hired for this great job. At this moment, without a functioning pen, he was in a state of inkompentense. Luckily, he found his cell phone and managed to get the number inkarcerated into it, before it was lost in the fog of poor memory. Hopefully he would not sound inkoherent at his interview...
Etymology: Incompetence (inability of a part or organ to function properly) & Ink (a liquid used for printing or writing or drawing) & Pen (writing implement) & Tense (make tense and uneasy or nervous or anxious;a grammatical category of verbs used to express distinctions of time)
Ballpointless
Created by: artr
Pronunciation: bôlˌpoint lis
Sentence: Rusty had a wonderful idea. This happened so infrequently that it seemed imperative to write it down. He reached for a ballpointless pen and proceeded to do little more than tear a hole in a piece of paper. This whole exercise was ballpointless. He then had to try his entire collection of paper scratchers. As he looked at the advertising message on a pen and wondered where he had pilfered each one, the original thought he wanted to save for humanity slowly faded away, never to return.
Etymology: ballpoint (a pen with a tiny ball as its writing point) + pointless (having little or no sense, use, or purpose)
Pendaver
Created by: Stevenson0
Pronunciation: pen/daver
Sentence: It's another of Murphy's Laws that writing utensils turn into pendavers when an important message needs to be scribbled.
Etymology: PENDAVER noun - from PEN (instrument for writing) + CADAVER (a dead body)
Pendicament
Created by: Eyeshah
Pronunciation: /pen-DIK-uh-mint/
Sentence: Pennelope found herself in quite the pendicament (quilemma) when her professor decided to give a pop quiz, and her backpack rummagings for a functional pen proved fruitless.
Etymology: pen+predicament=pendicament
Styless
Created by: pungineer
Pronunciation: Style/less
Sentence: Winston's major coronary failure was prompted when he was left styless in his own home, at the very moment he needed to write down the number flashing before him on the screen, his thoughtless children had taken all the functioning pens to school...
Etymology: Stylus - writing utensil + Less - opposite of more
----------------------------
COMMENTS:
No doubt his children thought he was styleless too. Daaaad, don't pick me up from school wearing that. - petaj, 2007-11-06: 07:09:00
ha, that'll teach them to steal all the good pens! - pungineer, 2007-11-06: 12:02:00
----------------------------
Impeniment
Created by: artr
Pronunciation: impenəmənt
Sentence: When Ralph saw the infomercial for the most wonderful thing he had even seen on late-night TV he just had to have it. As they displayed the phone number he frantically tried one impeniment after another. By the time he found one that worked they had moved on to products for incontinence. Ralph was pissed-off.
Etymology: impediment (a hindrance or obstruction in doing something) + pen (an instrument for writing or drawing with ink)
----------------------------
COMMENTS:
your sentence almost made me pee in my pants - thegoatisbad, 2010-03-03: 14:17:00
----------------------------
Paperblankwriter
Created by: TJayzz
Pronunciation: Pay-per-blan-k-ry-ter
Sentence: When Steve's boss called to tell him the date and details of a very important meeting, he thought he had better make a note of it as his memory was not his best asset. He picked up the nearest pen but it had run out of ink so he tried again , only to realise that all the pens in the house were paperblankwriters that refused to work. He made a vow to himself that next time he would always buy his pens in bulk and discard them as soon as they were running out.
Etymology: Paper(material made from wood pulp used for writing on) + Blank(empty, plain, not marked) + Writer(a device that writes information) = Paperblankwriter
----------------------------
COMMENTS:
playing the Beatles card eh? clever - Jabberwocky, 2008-10-03: 09:46:00
Being British what else could I do? - TJayzz, 2008-10-03: 13:06:00
A Hard Day's Write?? - Nosila, 2008-10-03: 20:16:00
hard to beatle. - OZZIEBOB, 2008-10-05: 17:36:00
----------------------------
Emptipendink
Created by: NeuroGlyph
Pronunciation: Empty-Pend-Ink
Sentence: It is better to be pendink on a sharpened pencil than emptipendink on a non-working pen.
Etymology: Independent/dependent...sub the dent w/ink.
Bickenscratch
Created by: xirtam
Pronunciation: bic-en-skrach
Sentence: With the only pen I could find out of ink, I had to bickenscratch the phone number into the note pad so I could read the indentations later.
Etymology: bic: a brand of pen + Chicken Scratch: slang; poor or illegible writing. Scratch: To write or draw by scraping or cutting the lines into a surface.
----------------------------
COMMENTS:
To be precise, this is the inevitable result of the event described, but I like it! 'He bickenscratched his way through the morning until he finally found a pen that worked.' - Tigger, 2007-11-06: 13:23:00
I like it too. Resembles my grocery list. - purpleartichokes, 2007-11-06: 20:01:00
----------------------------
Inklessdilemma
Created by: kellysue94
Pronunciation:
Sentence: i was having an inklessdilemma yesterday
Etymology:
Comments:
Today's definition was suggested by vixphilia. Thank you vixphilia! ~ James'
OZZIEBOB - 2007-11-06: 16:53:00
Good word!
Today's definition was suggested by vixphilia. Thank you vixphilia. ~ James
Petrikreink - 2020-03-03: 05:14:00