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Thread: Does "Wahoo" mean "derogatory word"?

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    NewHopeR is offline Senior Member
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    Default Does "Wahoo" mean "derogatory word"?

    Context:

    A special thank you to Marsha Donohoe, editor
    extraordinaire, for her hours of reediting and eradicating “the
    Wahoo” out of the tome (that’s “book” for those of you who
    reside in Yuba/Sutter Counties in Northern CA), so to provide
    the reader with a clear, precise sense of this story through the
    eyes of a child. For Marsha, it was a matter of “… Farmer’s
    Trust.”

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    emsr2d2's Avatar
    emsr2d2 is offline Moderator
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    Default Re: Does "Wahoo" mean "derogatory word"?

    It makes no sense to me. If I had to guess, I would say that it means something like "over-excited words and phrases" or "extraneous information" suggesting that the writer had got rather carried away with their writing and needed the editor to bring it back down to a sensible and clear version (as shown by the fact that the writer is thanking the editor for giving a "clear, precise sense of this story"). Perhaps the editor got rid of the "waffle" and the "flannel" from the writing, tidied it up and made it more understandable. That is, after all, an editor's job.

    I can't find a definition of "wahoo" that fits that, though. Had it said "yahoo" (without a capital letter) I could have connected it to the exclamation of delight and wonder which people sometimes make and which, I suppose, could be used to describe over-excitement in a piece of writing, but I've never heard that word used that way either.
    tzfujimino, Rover_KE and NewHopeR like this.
    Remember - correct capitalisation, punctuation and spacing make posts much easier to read.

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    abaka is offline Senior Member
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    Default Re: Does "Wahoo" mean "derogatory word"?

    A Child Called "It", author Dave Pelzer, right?

    The wahoo is a large fish. It is also what students at the University of Virginia call themselves, and a cheer they use to encourage their varsity teams.

    Because the wahoo is a fish that can drink and absorb twice its weight in water, in the context of your quote the obvious meaning is superfluous material that only muddles the story and can be squeezed out in much the same way the extra water can be squeezed out of a wahoo fish.

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