W00T and Other Happy Words

I've notice new "happy" words popping up lately. I love happy words. My son and I both say "Yay" so often that it's losing a little of it's potency. There's "yippee" and "woohoo". I know "woot" has been showing up lately. I read somewhere that it was w00t (with zeroes rather than o's) had originated from texting. I thought I read that in Webster's word a day, but I just checked and can't find it in the online Webster dictionary. (It does have an odd spelling....I think numbers would come before letters in the dictionary, right?) Apparently, there's a whole new dialect that is coming from our techno world of cell phone texting and IM'ing. I've seen "Coolio" a couple of times and yesterday someone used the expression "YAHTZEE!" I wasn't sure if it was just another cool way of saying "Yay!" or if he was suggesting we play a game of Yahtzee. Is that another one I've missed or was he just being unique?

What are your favorite "happy" words?

Comments: 11

Deb J. Feb 2, 2008, 9:18am EST

Yay!!! Allright! Cool! :o)

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Erin S. Feb 2, 2008, 9:50am EST

The Homer Simpson-esque "woo-hoo!" Or a good, old-fashioned "Boo-ya!"

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Danielle P. Feb 2, 2008, 10:16am EST

Woo hoo!! Awesome!!

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Aniko Feb 2, 2008, 2:00pm EST

If I use one of these, I'm likely to be ironic, but that's not the word's fault, of course.

Did you know w00t was Merriam-Webster's word of the year?

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Yvette F. Feb 2, 2008, 2:46pm EST

Aniko, THAT's where I read about it...Funny that it's Merriam-Webster's word of the year, yet I couldn't find it in their online dictionary. Must be because of the funky spelling...or maybe I just did it wrong. Thanks for sending me to Corrina's article!

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Aniko Feb 2, 2008, 3:37pm EST

That is pretty funny, but perhaps theywant to wait and see if it survives before putting in in the dictionary. A lot of these fad words don't.

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Karen T. Feb 3, 2008, 8:54pm EST

My mom works for FEMA, so she gets sent all over the country. On one of her first trips, she went to a town called Wahoo, Nebraska. In a local store, she bought a big arrow-shaped fridge magnet that just says "WAHOO!" Whenever I use that happy word, one of my faves, I think of the little town of Wahoo, and how happy everyone there must be...but I do prefer w00t these days, as my daughter in college was the one to introduce it to me, so it makes me picture her happy face. However, when used outside a texting situation, I believe it's spelled "whoot!"

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Yvette F. Feb 3, 2008, 9:15pm EST

Yes, that would be cool to live in Wahoo! Kind of a combo of Yahoo and WooHoo! I like all happy words and think it's great that more are popping up all the time!

Yahoo, yippee, yay, woo-hoo, wahoo, w00t, wahoo, coolio, coolocity, yahtzee, and boo-ya!

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