Pufflings (& Puffins)

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PUFFLINGS (& PUFFINS)

   A brief check shows that neither OED nor M-W has "puffling."  A puffling is a baby puffin.
   Puffins are all over Iceland.  They look like penguins, but they can fly (just barely).  They're really cute.
   I'm now in the Westman Islands, and there are about eight million puffins here.
   One movie that is showing is THE PUFFLING THIEF (A tale of local children competing to rescue the most baby puffins).  Another movie is THE KEIKO STORY, about the FREE WILLY star who lives here.  I might see him later today on the boat trip.
   OED does have an interesting "puff" note attached to the "puffin" entry.  But if it doesn't have "puffling," I'll huff and I'll puff.
   I asked the guide and the tourist info centre person about any Westman Islands slang.  The best I got is that puffins are sometimes called "professors."

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MISC.

A DICTIONARY OF OLD NORSE PROSE--At the Ana Magnuson (spelling?) manuscript museum at the University of Iceland (where I found "historiate"), there was a pamphlet about this dictionary.  They have Vol. 1 A-BAM and Vol. 2 BAN-DA.  It's not finished.  Perhaps I'll find food & drink in the sagas (skyr?) scholarly described sometime this century, but probably not soon.

INSTITUTE OF PHALLOLOGY AND THE ICELANDIC PHALLOLOGICAL MUSEUM--Yes, Reykjavik has a Phallological Museum.  It's one room.  It costs four bucks.  Don't go!  I did.  I asked if there was any slang for the thing (of the MALEDICTA sort).  They sold no such books, and the director provided me with no slang.  It's on the web at www.mh.is/vefir/phallus.

SLANG BOOKS--I've hunted the Reykjavik bookstores for slang books in either Icelandic or English (they sell a lot of books in English).  There was exactly one book.  It was by Jonathon Green.  Not even the two books I cited were sold.  I was told that a revised slang dictionary is in preparation, but I'll ask about that in the university library tomorrow morning.

FYI--I go home tomorrow.