Doolally

[L oki]

I also saw the posting, and sent the following message in reply (and
included my age at the end, since another bit of the since-erased message
said comments were comming mostly from "elderly" persons).

<<Several American subscribers have since written to say that
"doolally" is well known to them as a term for something whose
name one can't for the moment remember, so matching other US
words with the same meaning such as 'doofus', 'dohickey',
'doodad', and 'doojigger'.>>

I'm not familiar with doolally, but I'd want to correct another part of
this paragraph. While a dohickey is the same as a doodad which is the
same as a doojigger, they have nothing in common with a doofus, who is an
oaf; an uncaring, clumsy and/or mentally slow person. I suspect the term
may be influenced by the character Goofus, from the "Goofus and Gallant"
comics which taught most of us etiquette in "Highlights" magazine when we
were small children in waiting rooms everywhere.

~Owen Lorion (age 51) in Santa Fe