Last week, Webb’s Weird Words feted the new year by looking at new words in a new dictionary.

That would be the 12th edition of Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate, the first update of that venerable tome since 2003.

Now that I actually have one in my hands, here are a few reflections on this long-awaited revamp.

The first thing to note is that it lacks one of those glossy, wrap-around dustcovers — which is fine by me. With a frequently consulted reference like this, those covers soon get dinged and frayed; I generally wind up throwing them away.

But the second thing — and let’s face it, really the most important — is that it has a lot more definitions.

According to Wikipedia, MW’s 11th offered 165,000 entries, with a total of 225,000 meanings (because, of course, many words are used in more than one sense). MW claims it added roughly 6,000 new terms — and we looked at some of those last week (bingewatch, dad bod, doomscroll, photobomb, etc.). I can’t find a total anywhere online or in the new book itself, but … the 12th has clearly added more than just another half-grand.

For one thing, if we exclude the now-omitted appendices in MW’s 11th (more on that shortly) — and we look at just the main body of words & meanings — the new volume is 368 pages longer. And it’s physically bigger. And the font is smaller. So there really must be many thousands of new words and meanings.

I note as well numerous new gray boxes providing cool etymological info (i.e., where the word came from, and what it used to mean).

Ukulele, for example, is a Hawaiian word for “jumping flea.” “In a roundabout way,” says MW, it became attached to that instrument from the nickname of one Edward Purvis, a “small, lively” 19th-century British army officer known for playing it.

Or in the case of fractious, MW describes its relation to the Latin frangere, which has given us many words related to “breaking” or “pieces” (fraction, frail, fragile, etc.).

The 12th retains it useful illustrations — like for the manual alphabet (a.k.a. “sign language); the periodic table; and (my own favorite) a ranking of the hands in poker. (I can never recall whether a straight beats a flush.)

And the new book also offers roughly 50 “word lists.” These include: “commonly misspelled” (accommodate, cemetery, unnecessary); “rare and amusing insults” (cockalorum, lickspittle, mooncalf, twaddler); and “things that often go unnamed” (in other words, we puzzle over what it’s called). Those latter include aglet (the reinforced end of a shoelace); punt (“indentation at the bottom of a wine bottle”); and glabella (that bulge between your eyebrows).

MW also offers a short list of lesser-known acronyms (that’s a pronounceable abbreviation, like NASA or laser). I was amazed to see captcha — that internet box you check to prove you’re not a robot. (So now we humans have to convince machines that we are real — ack.) I always thought captcha was a slangy take on capture; but with a facetious nod to that pun, it actually stands for Completely Automatic Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart.

Wow.

(And in case you’re wondering: laser stands for “light amplification by the stimulated emission of radiation.”)

On the downside, this new MW omits the appendices from former editions: Foreign Words and Phrases; Biographical Names; Geographical Names; Signs and Symbols; and a “Handbook of Style” — addressing punctuation, capitalization and documentation.

I always found the second and third of those handy for pronouncing various proper nouns, plus birth & death dates for famous people — and geographical facts like population and capital cities.

I suppose MW left those out because we can now find them readily online — but I miss ’em anyway.

Indeed, when it comes to dictionaries (of which I now own nearly 90), I still prefer the amazing American Heritage — either the 4th or 5th edition.

For one thing, AH has three or four color illustrations on nearly every page. Also, the actual words are in in blue — making them more visible amid all that text. And there’s voluminous info on etymology: 60 pages of root-words, plus a master list of which main entries contain notes on usage and word-history.

It also offers 14 tables, including world alphabets, measurements and currency (the latter indicating which countries use which money units).

Unfortunately, the American Heritage is about twice the price of MW — and for that matter, about twice the weight as well. My handsome fourth checks in at a whopping eight pounds; so you can see why most folks prefer their laptop.

But I sure find the AH handy — um, even if I can’t pick it up with one hand….