cowabunga
intj/ˌkæɔəˈbaŋɡə//ˌkaʊəˈbʌŋɡə/UK/ˌkaʊəˈbʌŋɡə/US
Etymology
Unknown, but was popularized (as Kowa-Bunga) by Chief Thunderthud on the American children's show Howdy Doody in the late 1940s or early 1950s, and became associated with American surfing culture. By the early 1980s, it was used as the catch-phrase of Cookie Monster on the American television show Sesame Street, and gained popularity with a broader audience after its use in the American cartoon Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in the late 1980s and early 1990s. (For further treatment, see here.)
Definitions
Expressing amazement, enthusiasm, or joy.
- Cowabunga, dude!
- Kowa-Bunga! Then Me Fix You Good! You Be Sorry.
- Shouting the surfer's cry ‘Cowabunga!’ they climb a 12-ft. wall of water and ‘take the drop’ off its shoulder.
The neighborhood
Vish — recursive loop
No curated loop yet for cowabunga. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.
sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA