The 9 most interesting words I learned in 2016

As an editor at Business Insider, I spend all day reading and writing … and then reading and writing some more.

So it's no surprise that I'm a nerd when it comes to words.

Whenever I stumble across an unfamiliar word or phrase, I look it up and write it down in my planner, creating a log of all the new terms I've learned over the course of the year. (Like I said, nerd.)

I'm sure I'm not the only one out there with a propensity for learning and digesting new words, so I'm sharing my favorites from 2016 with the hope you'll find them as fun as I do.

Don't let me nerd out alone:

• Milquetoast: A very timid, unassertive, spineless person, especially one who is easily dominated or intimidated
• Gaslighting: To cause someone to doubt his or her sanity through the use of psychological manipulation
• Kismet: Fate, destiny
• Beaucoup: Many, numerous, much (it's the same in English as in its original French)
• Maladroit: Unskillful, awkward, bungling, tactless
• Profligate: Recklessly extravagant or wasteful
• Malfeasance: Wrongdoing by a public official
• Aspersion: An attack on the reputation of someone or something
• Cenote: A deep natural well or sinkhole (I discovered this word recently, when my colleagues used it beautifully in an article about eating at Trump Grill restaurant in Manhattan's Trump Tower.)

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