goober

English

WOTD – 23 July 2007

Via Gullah from Kongo nguba (“peanut”).

goober (plural goobers)

(chiefly Southern US) Synonym of peanut.
- 1833 November 7, Louisville Public Advertiser:
  A few bags Gouber Pea, or Ground Pea
- 1834 May 24, Cherokee Phoenix, p. 3:
  But he so seam I frade of he, I guess he steal my goober.
(chiefly Southern US, dated slang) Synonym of Georgian or North Carolinian, particularly those from the pine forests of the Sandhills region.
- 1863, Anonymous, "Castle Thunder" in Louis Napoléon Boudrye's Historic Records of the Fifth New York Cavalry..., Appendix, p. 339:
  Conscripts by the dozen...
  Come pouring in the Castle...
  Some from Mississippi state and “Goobers” from Tar river.
- 1871, Maximilian Schele de Vere, Americanisms, p. 57:
  The peanuts or earth-nuts known in North Carolina and the adjoining States as Goober peas, so that during the late Civil War a conscript from the so-called ‘piney woods’ of that State was apt to be nick-named a Goober.
(chiefly US, childish slang) A foolish, simple, or amusingly silly person.
- 2012 August 5, Nathan Rabin, "The Simpsons (Classic): 'I Love Lisa'", A.V. Club:
  For Ralph, any encouragement is too much. When Lisa gives Ralph a valentine bearing that locomotive pun that so affected The Simpsons’ showrunner, Ralph misinterprets the gesture as a genuine display of romantic interest rather than a gesture of pity from a thoughtful young geek to a friendless goober.

goober (third-person singular simple present goobers, present participle goobering, simple past and past participle goobered)

(slang, intransitive) To drool or dribble.
(slang, transitive) To drip or slather; to apply a gooey substance to a surface.

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