Noomesque

Shaped by Noom.

Seymour came up behind Enid as she stood in front of the mirror and admired her diminished waistline. “Noomesque,” he said with gusto.
“Let’s go to bed,” she assented.

On the phone to Justine in Paris, Polly asked how measuring out her cassoulet was affecting her weight. “Le poids,” you mean,” snickered Justine. “Still positively Noomesque.”

“Panda, you’re the last person I’d think would do Noom,” says JoJo.
“I know,” says The Good One, grimacing, “but intermittent fasting suits my budget, and I will be Noomesque until pops venmo's mama a quid or two.”

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Zoom broom

Eliminating the background distractions.

“Denise,” went the text from my boss last Sunday, “when we do the meetup with Amway could you please do a zoom broom on your so-called office -- jettison the vibrators, the pogo stick, the pink silk thingie hanging just on screen. The signed blowup of Bono from ’98 too. We don’t want Chris to think we’re wack. Oh, and could you make sure that snot-nosed Berry doesn’t poke her face in?”
“Shithead,” I replied under my breath, “It’s not Zoom, it’s WebEx. It's not Berry, it's Valley. Plus, I only accept texted managerial counsel of under 10 words.”

To prep for the interview (for the job he didn’t even want, but it would pay for tacos) Panda did a quick zoom broom in the study he “shared” with mama, backlighting the Mac and taking down the hanging hooked rug depicting a bald eagle descending upon a Hudson River ice floe. Darn these Zoom gigs, he thought, feeling pretty sure he’d have to shave his soul patch.

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Spindrone

If Equinox is short staffed—dire times require out-of-the-box measures.

“I actually prefer the spindrone,” Nur confessed to Azalea, wiping the sweat from their brow then sanitizing their glutes. “I have less to answer for when I can’t manage the tap back.”
“Right,” said Azalea, who wasn’t sure she agreed. “And the spindrone doesn’t mind if you switch off Find U Again for Bennie and the Jets?”

“Mr. Garcia,” pipes in the peon from the Club’s front desk. “There’s a new spindrone here to see you about the MWF noon slot. I offered it water but it said hydration would be unnecessary.
“Good!” chortles the club manager, unknotting the noose he had only just constructed for himself out of locker room towels, “Finally an instructor who’s not a drama queen.”

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Fauxmosexual

You know it and they know it, and everyone thinks it's fine, but the closet is still a deep, comfortable place.

Mickey the fauxmosexual, divorced with a grown son, still flies to the Big Apple from Elk Horn four times a year to see the Broadway shows, stay at the 14th Street Y and spend long hours “chatting with my favorite bartenders.” Creams over Mariah and Mendelssohn interchangeably.

“Sissy Oliphant has been known to date men,” I told my bestie quizzically, “but she has moved from pad to pad with the same woman since she graduated from Barnard a decade ago and still throws Ellen theme parties; don’t tell me she’s not a fauxmosexual.”

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Maskmuffle

When the spoken word cannot be heard because of the mouth’s covering with some impervious fabric.

“I’m sorry you had to wait on that frigid corner,” I told Tobee again when we were home in our warm drop seats. “I said East Second street, you heard East Seventh. It was a maskmuffle.”
“If you invoke the maskmuffle excuse one more time,” Tobee said, “I will pour this mulled cider on your wig!”

Sweetums-Angelica didn’t know if her dear old mother ignored her when she directed her to put the cow’s milk in the SubZero, or if it was just another case of mask muffle.

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pre-grieve

Also pre-grieving, pre-grieved. How you handle it when someone dear to you is near death.

“Curtis came through like a tornado, sulking and fuming” said Maddie after Winston finally came out of the ICU feet first , “and you couldn’t say a word without him blowing up.”
Offering scant reassurance, Bruce said “You can’t take it personally, though, he wasn’t mad at you, he was pre-grieving.”
“He was still a little shit,” said Maddie.

"Mom was so staunch when Dad was in hospice." says Rosemarie. "She pre-grieved by completely reorganizing the china cupboard, the linen closet and even the glove box of his Caddie."

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Rendezscrew

A delightful interlude.

“Our rendezscrew at Chute Jean-Larose was dope,” says Anne. “We could barely stand afterward.”
“Wow,” said Lloyd. The waterfall was a famous aphrodisiac, he knew, though he was too shy to perpetrate such a romp himself.
“Lucky we stopped afterward at the Basilica of Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupre,” Anne brags further. “We snitched some thrown-off crutches to use in limping home.”
“It’s a miracle you survived,” Lloyd deadpans punnily. “Live to fuck another day.”

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