bumpery

comparative more bumpery · superlative most bumpery

1. colloquialrareSynonym of bumpy (“having or involving bumps”).

   ‘Ooh, Flipip,’ came Baby B’s muffled voice from inside the rucksack, ‘it’s millions bumpery in here. And Nick is a bit half prickerly when I bumper him.’

   1986, Nigel Hinton, chapter 8, in Run to Beaver Towers (Andersen Young Readers’ Library; Beaver Towers, 3), London: Andersen Press, →ISBN, page 41

   5 more examples

   My neighbors’ children play with me. / They come for me to ease their woes, / Bleedery stumpings of the toes, / Splinters in fingers, at whose base / Angels have left their kissery trace; / Skinned elbows and such bruisery rings, / Or bumpery dots from wood bees’ stings.

   1917, The Christian Advocate, volume XCII, New York, N.Y., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 559, column 1

   The bushes were long, dry, tall, skinny, scraggly things, twisting and bending like dancers over hot coals, then running up on long bumpery limbs to grab a thin fistful of free sky.

   1947–1948 (date written), Woody Guthrie, “Study Butte”, in Seeds of Man: An Experience Lived and Dreamed, New York, N.Y.: E. P. Dutton & Co., published 1976, →ISBN, page 176

   Nowadays Malindo road getting too very bumpery, isn’t it, vee all-the-time complaining Regional Engineer but Mr. MacKinnon is all-the-time saying Works Department one calamitous shortage of funds got – Bye-bye!

   1971, David Bee, The Victims, Johannesburg: Macmillan South Africa, →OCLC, page 49

   [H]e directs her now, with hand signals, into bumps and rinds, while he sings—Pill going Al one better, not just describing his vision but demonstrating it. […] They’re all out there in the bumpery hallway now, shouting their heads off over it.

   1976, Vance Bourjaily, “Canterbury”, in Now Playing at Canterbury, New York, N.Y.: The Dial Press, →ISBN, pages 479–480 482

   While reading a bedtime story to my four-year old grandson, Ezekiel, he was leaning against me and rubbing my elbow. He inquisitively asked “why is your elbow so bumpery”? […] He is forming his final conclusion to this situation, and he replied shaking his little head “Noooo, your elbow is bumpery because you’re old and mine isn’t because I’m new .” Yes, it’s true I have become a little bumpery.

   2013, Lynna Ampe, “[Ladies Devotions]”, in Living Daily in the Word: Devotions by the Ladies of the Calvary Chapel Living Word, Irvine, Calif.: Living Word Publishers, →ISBN, page 27

   Synonyms: bumpy

1. colloquialrareuncountableBumping.

   At each station of his cross, he was forced into a state of bumpery with so many backs and fronts.

   1982, Michael Seide, chapter 15, in The Common Wilderness, [Brooklyn, N.Y.]: Fiction Collective, →ISBN, page 550

   2 more examples

   Upon entering, we were greeted with the sight of Tynee leaping across the sofa from Miss Mary. […] General Kiljoy wagged his finger at Tynee, shaking his head in mock disapproval at their bumpery.

   2001, Tony Vigorito, chapter 77, in Just a Couple of Days, Columbus, Oh.: Bast Books, →ISBN, page 173

   We’ve now spent eight years watching Republican congressmen scurrying hither and thither brandishing pitchforks, outraged at the latest whiff of terrorist fist-bumpery.

   2016 September 4, Hari Kunzru, “The [Barack] Obama years: novelists assess his legacy”, in The New Review (The Observer), London, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 04 Sep 2016, page 8, column 1