Discombobulate

How can discombobulate be a word?

I have heard this word twice in the past week. Once by a very well educated person whom I respect. It gave me great pause.

I think this accumulation of letters is one of those “made up” words. I know it was not in the big unabridged dictionary in the Centreville (Mississippi) Academy library when I was in high school in the late seventies. I know this for our world class English teachers, Mrs. Germany, Mrs. Smith, or Mrs. Walters would certainly have made us use it in a sentence, just as they did with the likes of ogre, buffoon, and raucous. Discombobulate is just too cool a word for them to just skip over and not insist upon its daily usage. Therefor the word must be “new” or simply invented by someone with too much time on their hands.

For the record, discombobulate means to confuse or disconcert, to upset or frustrate. The actual act of discombobulating is called discombobulation. Not to be confused, of course, with discombobulated, which is what you are after the discombobulation has occurred.

I am acquainted with several persons after which spoken to for a short time, I feel totally confused and disconcerted…sometimes even upset and frustrated. I now know these folks to be discombobulators. And they should be avoided at all costs.

If I were a betting man, which I am not, but if I were, I would bet that you know some discombobulators also.

One of them may have the given name of Tim. Sorry… sometimes it just happens...it is simply unexplainable. I am thinking of marketing a new bumper sticker…

Discombobulation Happens!

It has obviously been a slow morning for me in the thought department.