Last year yielded a number of words I wish I hadn’t had to learn and fervently hope not to need much longer. To wit:

pod Formerly: a container, like the inedible green things that peas grow in or, in trendy offices and schools, a partly-enclosed seating area for work or study. Currently: the group you can hang out with indoors and maskless, knowing that everyone’s germs have already mingled. Also a verb, as in “I podded up with my son and his family after I passed quarantine.”

doomscroll An unfortunately apt verb, arising from the fact that nearly everything on our screens these days foretells impending doom in one form or another. An inadvisable practice because if the sky is falling (pretty much the only disaster we haven’t had to worry about in the last 12 months), it will fall whether we obsess about it or not.

Blursday Vague but useful time marker for when you never see anyone or anything new (see pod, doomscroll above).

Murder Hornet As if 2020 weren’t bad enough. And yes, they’re real.

Also real is this sign from the window of a dentist’s office:

Presumably the first option makes you not care that your teeth really need the second.

I could go on (and on and on, see Blursday) but instead I’ll end this post with two words I do NOT understand, as in why anyone would ever select them: X Æ A-12 and !!!!!. The first is the name of Elon Musk and Grimes’s son, the second this deli:

X Æ A-12 is still with us, but !!!!! went out of business long before the pandemic, perhaps because employees couldn’t figure out how to answer the phone. “Hello, you’ve reached !!!!!, may I take your order?” is a little hard to imagine.

Feel free to send me your own candidates for words you wish you didn’t know. Happy Blursday to you, and happy new year, too.