During the six or so years that my wife and I have been together, we've had our share of issues.  Some of these, have been the direct result of me being brought up in a Conservative Jewish household, whilst my wife was brought up almost completely agnostic.  Much to my surprise, the vast majority of these religion based problems revolve around non-overlapping lexicons.

For instance, my wife often writes in texts and emails "Uff-tah."

The first time I saw this expression on my cell phone screen, I figured auto-correct had ruined yet another important text message.  Not so, my wife later informed me when I asked her if her "uffage" had been some sort of typing problem.

"Uff-tah," she says louder, as if perhaps it is the lack of volume and repetition that is keeping me from immediately understanding a group of letters I've never seen put together before.  Like, "oh my goodness, how horrible. Or, uff-tah, this bucket is heavy."

"Ahhhhhhh,"I reply, "you mean 'oy-vey!'"

She assured me she meant Uff-tah.

Since that day, I have been trying to figure out where uff-tah fits in my life, its primary definition already completelyoverlapped by Yiddish slang.  Today, I found it.

Today, after finishing my coffee, I went to the coffee-shop bathroom to go pee before heading down the street for lunch.  As I approached the two adjacent bathrooms a slight woman was just exiting the near door while the far door appeared occupied.  I, obviously, went into the open one and closed the door behind me only to find myself trapped inside a mind-gagging gas chamber of poop.  While the tiny woman had flushed, the evil that she had previously contained inside her was now echoing its displeasure to all corners of the small rectangular room.

everyone likes a little encouragement.

As I inhaled, I feel this woman's fecal matter enter my lungs, and reflexively I exhale, "UFFFF-tahhh."

It seems, 'Uff-tah' is the sound I make when I am forced to smell another person's shit in high concentration.  This is true both literally and metaphorically.

I figure the Jews never came up with their own word for this concept, because whenever they were trapped in small contained spaces, the smell was usually the least of their worries.