Icks of the Trade*

Meville describes our opinion of November with the opening lines of Moby Dick, where Ishmael says,

Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off - then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball. (our emphasis)

Apparently, we're not the only ones to feel this way in November, especially regarding our jobs.

The Atlantic's Barbara Wallraff runs a regular feature titled Word Fugitives, in which she asks readers to contribute names for the situations of modern life. Back in July/August, she requested coinages for *"'unpleasant occurances that come with a job'--that is, a word for the opposite of a perquisite." In the December issue, she gives top honors to icks of the trade, but readers submitted other notable coinages, too:

. . . the most popular suggestion was cringe benefit. Arno McTavin, of Longmont, Colo., proposed fringe badefit; Ann Rock of Grosse Pointe Park, Mich., the rather erudite not-a-bene; and a few readers the Judeo-Christian trials of job.

Bruce Evans, of Mesa, Ariz., sugested dreckuisite; Apryl Lamb of Durham, N.C., suquisite; and more than one reader irquisite. Gail Wells, of Corvallis, Ore., wrote, "I'd call them stuckquisites, as in 'Guess I'm stuckquisite again.'" David Noller, of Burbank, Calif., wrote, "This is known as a gozewit--as in, 'Hey buddy, dat goze wit' da territory!'"

You can read the entire Word Fugitives article in the December issue of The Atlantic.