Various people have written at various times: > Wrootchy - the kids have ants in their pants, can't sit still -(spielkuss > in Yiddish) > > or Wrootching - squirming as in "wrootching in your seat" Probably from Standard German 'verru"cken' - to displace, shift, disturb, confuse > Gnotch - [long O as in oval] - as in "Quit gnotching the dog" - annoying, > pestering an animal. I don't recall having heard it used in reference to > annoying people. Possibly related to Standard German 'gnarren' - to snarl, whine & 'gnatzig' - irritable, grumpy. >stroobly - "Your hair is stroobly." All messed up, needs to be combed. Cf. Standard German 'Strobel' - mop of hair, 'strubelig, struppig, strub - shaggy, unkempt, tousled, etc.' >ferhuddled - "I'm all ferhuddled." Mixed up, confused. Cf. Standard German 'verhudeln/verhunzen' which both mean to bungle or botch >How about the word "WOPPERJAWED" for something that is crooked? Mary Jo May be related to the German 'wabbelig' - wobbly, but could also be from the English words wobbly and yaw, a nautical term that it's not unreasonable to think may have entered PA Dutch vocabulary on the trips across the ocean. If so, it would have been written jaw, etc. by the Pa Dutch. Of course, there may be some German nautical word corresponding to English yaw that I'm not familiar with. >"Quickly I must redd the table off; spritz the dishes, run the stairs up, >get dressed to go the town down, look the windows in, cause they're running >things off." >How could I ever learn to never end a sentence with? Finally, there's the Western PA child whose mother brought upstairs a bedtime-story book that he didn't like. He said, 'Mommy, what did you bring the book I didn't want to be read to out of up for?" If you understood that sentence, you've definitely got some Pennsylvania Dutch in your cultural heritage somewhere. Ed Book