What do you call someone you carpool with?
What do you call someone you carpool with?
Obviously, in the carpool you'd simply call them by their name. But if you are speaking about them, to an audience who might not know any of the people you carpool with (and suppose they might not—for whatever reason—want their name immediately Googlable), what's the best term to use to refer to them?
- My carpooler? My fellow carpooler? The other carpooler?
- My carpooling companion? My carpooling buddy? My carpool buddy?
- My co-worker? [What if we don't work for the same employer?]
- My neighbor? [What if we don't live near each other?]
They all feel awkward to me. Carpooler, especially. To my ear carpooler sounds like a made up word. But it's in at least one respectable dictionary. If you Google on the term (today) you'll find that roughly one-third of the top search results are for slipper socks. Strange, that.
—Michael A. Cleverly
Monday, August 08, 2005 at 22:54