New Word For You All: Scrumish

I've come across one of those situations which I don't believe the current English vocabulary adequately caters for. Therefore, I have invented a new word, and have decided to dedicate this entire post to explaining its meaning.

The word is scrumish (pronounced scroo-mish). It's a verb, as in "I scrumished my painting for about fifteen minutes."

It is something of an amalgam of the following words:

• scrutinise
• relish

And this more or less sums up its meaning. To scrumish is to examine something with greatest satisfaction and hearty contentment. The thing in question is usually something which has been either made by, or is owned by, the scrumisher. Examples include:

• A story they have written
• A cake they have baked
• A small DIY job successfully completed

This also encompasses less tangible, online things, such as an online bank account, as I and others I have spoken to enjoy viewing the bank account balances, often unnecessarily.

It's a little bit like this:

"Victor Hampelshire breathed in the brisk, cold, morning air

as he strode around the perimeter of his country estate. As he strode, he admired everything about it: the garden bed his underpaid servants had been tending to all spring, the house he had inherited from his affluent family, and the great expanses of lawn upon which a flock of wandering sheep were grazing peacefully.

He would shoot the sheep later, he reflected, for he had warned Mr McMaggins more than once to keep them contained. But for now, Victor Hampelshire was filled from top hat to leather riding boots with a warm, proud, utterly fulfilled yet intense happiness and attachment to his estate."

So scrumish is just like that...only in your head.

Above: Even animals are capable of scrumishing, as this dog surveys the pleasing work he has done.

It's the re-reading of an essay that isn't really necessary. It's that skimming over a great set of results that doesn't quite serve a practical purpose. It's that little buzz you get when you read over a well liked Facebook status.

And I think it's fantastic. The more I think about it, the more I come to the conclusion that scrumishing is humankind's own little triumph. It's our assertion of the belief that we can control our environment around us, even if we cannot control so many other forces in our life. It's a little buzz knowing that you created something that you're happy with.

Now if you'll excuse me, I think I'll publish this post, before giving it the scrumishing it deserves.