A Fear Of Fibbing Fridays

So, Pensitivity101 wants to know, “What do you think these are phobias of?”

Ablutophobia

It’s a fear of having to watch old Popeye cartoons.  Does anyone remember when the bad-guy character, ‘Bluto’ suddenly became ‘Brutus,’ because King Features couldn’t keep their books straight?

Androphobia

It is the fear of having yet another Terminator sequel movie released.  It would be sad to see Arnold hobbling around like a geriatric T-800 model with a cane, or walker.

Ataxophobia

This is the fear of the approaching, mid-April deadline, both with the American IRS, (Notice that The IRS spells theirs) and the UK Inland Revenue.  Canadians get another two weeks of paralyzing terror each year – until the end of the month.  It’s no favour!  I say it’s like ripping a Band-Aid off.  Be like Nike, and Just Do It!

Autophobia

This is the quite-reasonable distress caused by having to go out upon the streets and roads with all those Other Drivers.  I’m okay, but they’re all just a bunch of weird accidents, waiting to happen, and probably catching me in the crunch.
Anyone who doesn’t drive as fast as me is an idiot.  Anyone who drives faster than me is an asshole.  Forget World Peace – envision using your turn signals.

Bathmophobia is the fear of the end of the day, when you have three preschoolers and a sandbox.  Soap suds spreading faster than The Big Bang – and when you finally get them all clean, you discover that one of them is the neighbour’s kid.  😳

Chromophobia has suffered technological obsolescence.  50 years ago, the little gear-head greasers plated every piece of exposed metal on their cars bright and shiny silver.  Today’s OY-Generation decorate their penis-substitute Lego-plastic toy cars with neon brothel-lights, rear spoilers whose only purpose is to hold beers while they brag to each other, and modify their exhausts so that little Dachshund cars sound like Great Danes.  They claim that they soup them up!  Yeah, right – soup in a sieve.  😯

Ephebiphobia is the feeling of unease, when you realize that your unmarried aunt has been batting for both teams all along.  Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Genuphobia is the fear non-Catholics have, of having to attend a wedding or baptism in a Catholic church.  You never know when to kneel, or when to stand up, or sit down.  They’re all up and down like a prostitute’s panties.  By the time you figure it out, they’ve got the hymnbook out, and are singing.

Heliophobia

Ever since Kobe Bryant’s little mishap, it’s what has caused me to decide to not use gasoline-powered aerial eggbeaters as a mode of transportation.  It’s not what I want people to mean when they say, “He was a down-to-Earth person.”  👿

Nomophobia

This is an irrational fear of garden figurines.

Osmophobia was the absolute panic I felt when I heard a rumour that some television network, desperate to replace lost viewers, was going to give Donny and Marie another hour-long variety show.  At their age, they can’t carry a tune in a bucket.  Donny’s ‘little bit Rock and Roll’ would be shuffle and wheeze, and his purple socks would be orthopedic.

Podophobia is a fear of being unexpectedly called upon to say a few words at some community gathering.  Unaccustomed as I am at public speaking – I’m gonna sit down, have another beer, and let the paid performing seals do their job.

Trypophobia

This was the terrible uncertainty that I felt recently.  I went into the office break room early in the morning.  Someone had put out a Tupperware container of fudge brownies, so I took one.  I returned soon after, to see if the coffee machine had finished.  There was now a note on the brownie box.

I Made These Brownies For Shits And Giggles
Half of them have cannabis.
The other half have laxative
Try One. Wait a half-hour, and find out which.

Wiccaphobia

Which way did they go?  How many of them were there?  When did they leave?  I must find them – for I am their leader.

This is the fear that you are going to be assigned another project, because your boss is not sufficiently computer-literate to access the internet and look for himself.  Not only will you have to do extra research, but it will be on constantly-changing websites that can be edited by people who wear MAGA hats, and believe that the world is flat.  😥

Zuigerphobia

It’s the feeling of imminent doom that arises locally, beginning about the middle of September, when we realize that half a million people who want to get drunk and obnoxious, and throw up in a different town, are about to descend on our city for Oktoberfest.  Before I retired, I used to book the week off – not to party, but because I was tired of getting pulled over in DUI/RIDE Program Traffic checks.  That really sucks.  😉

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I have a phobia that Pensitivity didn’t list.  It’s demifiniphobia.  That’s the fear I felt when I looked at all these big, fancy words, worried that I will only be able to respond to about half the prompts, and end up looking like a half-assed halfwit.

’20 A To Z Challenge – Z

And the First shall be Last, and Last shall be First.  At last we are approaching the first of a new alphabet challenge – But first, the word

ZENOSYNE

zenosyne – The sense that time keeps going faster. .Coined in 2012 by John Koenig in The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, https://www.dictionaryofobscuresorrows.com/ a project to create a compendium of invented words for every emotion we might all experience but don’t yet have a word for.  And Keta – an image that inexplicably leaps back into your mind from the distant past.  Koinophobhia – the fear that one may have lived an ordinary life.  Wytai – feature(s) of modern life that one may consider absurd, like zoos, drinking milk, or organ transplants. 

Morii is the desire to capture a fleeing experience, something we try to do incessantly every waking minute of our lives these days, with Instagram stories, photographs, and snaps.  Lacheism is a longing for clarity of a disaster or apocalypse.  Lilo is a friendship that can lie dormant for years only to pick right back up instantly, as if no time had passed since you last saw each other.  Astrophe – the feeling of being stuck on earth when there is an entire universe or beyond to explore.  Modus tollens – is the feeling that the plot of your life doesn’t make sense any more. 

Onism is the realization of how little of the world you will experience.  Socha is the hidden vulnerability of others.  Lutalica is the part of your personality that doesn’t fit into categories.  Vemödalen is the fear that everything has already been done, and Avenoir is the desire to see memories in advance. 

We take it for granted that life moves forward.  But you move as a rower moves – facing backward.  You can see where you’ve been, but not where you are going.  And your boat is steered by a younger version of you.  It is hard not to wonder what life would be like, facing the other way.

Klexos is the art of dwelling on the past.  Your life is written in indelible ink.  There’s no going back to erase the past, tweak the mistakes, or fill in the missed opportunities.  When the moment’s over, your fate is sealed.

Xeno is the smallest measurable unit of human connection, typically exchanged between passing strangers—a flirtatious glance, a sympathetic nod, a shared laugh about some odd coincidence—moments that are fleeting and random but still contain powerful emotional nutrients that can alleviate the symptoms of feeling alone.

Mahpiohanzia is the disappointment of being unable to fly.  Being unable to stretch out your arms and vault into the air, having finally shrugged off the ballast of your own weight and ignited the fuel tank of unfulfilled desires you’ve been storing up since before you were born.

Trumspringa is the temptation to step off your career track and become a shepherd in the mountains, following your flock between pastures with a sheepdog and a rifle, watching storms at dusk from the doorway of a small cabin, just the kind of hypnotic diversion that allows your thoughts to make a break for it and wander back to their cubicles in the city.

Kairosclerosis is the moment you realize that you’re currently happy—consciously trying to savor the feeling—which prompts your intellect to identify it, pick it apart and put it in context, where it will slowly dissolve until it’s little more than an aftertaste.

Sonder – the realization that each passerby has a life as vivid and complex as yours
Opia – The ambiguous intensity of looking someone in the eye, which can feel simultaneously invasive and vulnerable.
Monachopsis – The subtle but persistent feeling of being out of place.

Kenopsia – The forlorn atmosphere of a place that is usually bustling with people, but is now abandoned.

Mauerbauer-Traurigkeit – The inexplicable urge to push people away, even close friends that you like.

Énouement – The bitter-sweetness of having arrived in the future, seeing how things turn out, but not being able to tell your past self.
Vellichor – The strange wistfulness of used-book shops.

Anticipointment – The sinking feeling when anticipation fails to be the greater part of pleasure.
Jouska – A hypothetical conversation that you compulsively play out in your head.

This man obviously had way too much time, sitting by himself in the attic.  I don’t know whether he should have taken more drugs – or less.  At least he got an entire book out of it – portions of which I have stolen researched, and used for free, for this post.

The same old alphabet begins with brand-new words in a couple of weeks.  This year, C may be for Compulsive.