It's time once again for every editor's favorite event: the annual release by dictionary publishers of their Word of the Year. Here are the winners for 2008:

Merriam-Webster: Bailout. Definitely a sign of the times, the word meaning "rescue from financial distress" was the one most looked up in the online dictionary in the shortest period of time.

Oxford University Press: Hypermiling. Another sign of the times, hypermiling refers to drivers' attempts to maximize gas mileage by making fuel-conserving adjustments to their car and their driving techniques.

Catherine Jones: Prorogue. Perhaps better known in Canada than in the United States, prorogue means to postpone or defer or to discontinue a session. And it hasn't been popular for the whole year, just this month. In fact, most of us Canadians had never even heard of it until our parliament was prorogued to cool down a political firestorm. Still, it's been a fun word for the month. Around our office, we're proroguing meetings we don't feel like attending or suspect won't go as well as we want. And some Scrooges have even threatened to prorogue Christmas.

2008 warrants more than just one Word of the Year. So after searching the Internet (including the fun sites of www.buzzwhack.com and www.urbandictionary.com), I found a few contenders.

Textrovert: Someone who feels braver expressing opinions while texting, as opposed to in person.

Cyberchondriac: Someone who imagines he has a disease based on medical information found on the Internet.

Grandboss: The boss of your boss.

Nanomanager: A boss who takes micromanaging to a whole new level of nitpicking.

Selective ignorance: The act of selectively ignoring information, such as emails, news and other communications.

Anyone want to try using all these words in one sentence? If you choose to prorogue this challenge, we'll understand.

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