dookie

[Arnold M. Zwicky]

On Sep 23, 2004, at 11:57 AM, Jesse Sheidlower wrote:

> On Thu, Sep 23, 2004 at 11:45:18AM -0700, Arnold M. Zwicky wrote:
>>
>> i don't have "dookie" , so i'm trying to figure out its syntax.  above
>> it's used as a count noun (like "turd"), and similarly in "dookies"
>> for
>> "Dukies".  but HDAS glosses it as 'excrement', which suggests a mass
>> use (like the most common uses of "shit") as well.  is this possible?
>> things like, "gross, there's dookie all over the floor"?
>
> In my ideolect I only have it as a mass noun, and HDAS defined it
> thus, with 'excrement' as the def, based on the evidence it had.
> But there is clear evidence of count-noun use (Google for "take a
> dookie", for example),

a small quibble.  while "take a shit/dookie/piss" are obviously
count-noun uses of these nouns, these uses are constrained to a small
number of idiomatic contexts, and these uses don't predict "free"
count-noun uses.  but we've seen some of those for "dookie", so it gets
to be a count noun independent of the "take" idiom.

arnold