Phobias Are Phun

Phobias are rather hilarious, if you are fortunate enough to not have them. Not the normal phobias, like achluophobia- the fear of darkness, which every normal person experiences at least once in their life and the obvious ephebiphobia- the fear of teenagers. I'm talking things like pteronophobia- the fear of being tickled by feathers and geniophobia- the fearing of chins. Phobialist has a astonishingly full list of potential fears and their oftentimes amusing names.

Here are my favorites:

Hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia- the fear of long words. Methinks this one to be quite cruel.

Lutraphobia- the fear of otters. (But they're so fuzzzzzy.)

Psellismophobia- the fear of stuttering. Because it is hilarious to add in s's in for people with disrupted speech patterns. Hilarious. Oh, you. 

Stasibasiphobia or Stasiphobia- the fear of standing or walking. How does these people live their lives?

Walloonphobia- Fear of the Walloons. What is a walloon? Why should I fear it?!

According to Wikipedia, the Walloons were a romance-speaking people from German and Celtic origin that typically live in Walloonia, Belgium and speak the language, Walloon. Seriously. But the Wikipedia entry has nothing to say about them being scary. This phobia clearly is for people who fear the Germans, or germanophobia.

Zemmiphobia- Fear of the great mole rat. Hairless, midly adorable, buck-toothed. DOESN'T LOOK SO GREAT TO ME. More like dorkily adorable, but I suppose that that doesn't lend itself as well to a name. Though Wikipedia doesn't have a reference for "Great Mole Rat," they do cite the "Greater Mole Rat" (his older cooler brother) that lives in Russia and Ukraine. So we have nothing to fear, people. 

Dan, my boyfriend, and I had a long discussion on these more humorous phobias. He was so inspired by the talk that he found a site where he could post his own story about phobias, more specifically his fear of ferris wheels. 
This is the start of a beautiful career.

In Dan's Words: My Fear Of Ferris Wheels