I ran across the above word the other day and was completely stumped. Like I assume everyone else in the world does, I tried to figure out the meaning through the context. No luck whatsoever. I then used my reader’s dictionary. There was no Horren and no Dously. I tried to look up the word with the dash present, my reader’s dictionary, for some reason, probably user incompetence, would not allow me to look up the word with the dash in the middle.

I pondered it a little more. It came to me in a flash, it is a German phrase. Why it was German, I can not tell you but I was convinced. Well, in case you are wondering, it isn’t a German phrase, nor French for that matter. I tried rereading sentence for context again. No, I was still baffled.

In desperation, I went to Google Search where, miraculously, a word appeared but with no dash in the middle. Horrendously. I didn’t bother to read definition because it couldn’t be right, the word is Horren-dously. There is a dash in the middle. I tried google it again and I got the full word without a dash. I read the definition which was something like done badly or done appallingly.

Smug guy that I am, I thought well that can’t be right. The word Horren-dously came in the middle of the line, not the end of one line and the beginning of another line. That would be the only time I should see horrendously separated like that.

I reread the sentence yet again. The author did mean horrendously.

Damn dash.