With age comes wisdom, they say. What they fail to say is that with age, forgetfulness comes too. Increasingly, words fail me… literally. Always names or nouns and not for long. But there’s definitely a delay every now and then. Thankfully, there is a huge selection of possible alternatives which you can use to buy yourself some time while your brain frantically scrambles around looking for the right word. For example: doodah, thingummyjig, whatsit, thingumabob, gubbins, oojamaflip, whatchamacallit, gizmo, thingy… the list is long. Whatnot. But here things get a bit complicated. Because a whatnot is also a useless ornament (my apologies to all collectors of porcelain figurines!). A whatnot, or knickknack or in the case of a collection of such odds and ends – bric-a-brac. According to Wikipedia, bric-a-brac, originally from the French and first used in the Victorian era, refers to […] collections of curios, such as elaborately decorated teacups and small vases, compositions of feathers or wax flowers under glass domes, decorated eggshells….
There’s even a special piece of furniture for displaying your bits and bobs; it’s called… that’s right, a whatnot! An etagère in French. A mahogany whatnot. Shelving to make sure you don’t get your knickknacks in a twist! 😊