tired and emotional
"tired-and-emotional" is a 17-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“tired and emotional” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 19
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 2, 2026) - Drunk.
Corpus desk
Index EN-tired-and-emotional · tired and emotional · English
tired and emotional · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 19 letters
- VOW-8 8 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "T" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | tired and emotional |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| Letters | 19 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “tired and emotional” sits in English frequency
Rare enough to double-check
tired and emotional is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anadjective. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for tired and emotional, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. Our dataset records no confusable match here, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: First used by the British satirical magazine Private Eye in 1967, in a spoof diplomatic memo to describe the state of cabinet minister George Brown. It is now used as a stock phrase and euphemism to avoid litigation for libel, and the phrase has spread well… The correct English form is tired and emotional, spelled T-I-R-E-D- -A-N-D- -E-M-O-T-I-O-N-A-L.
Definition
- 1Drunk.
- 2Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see tired, emotional.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how tired and emotional appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
In 2008, after what you imagine was a tired and emotional dinner, the novelist Michel Houellebecq and the philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy determined to start writing to each other about the things that kept them awake at nights.
There's nothing like a singalong with tired and emotional Lib Dems [headline]
Etymology
First used by the British satirical magazine Private Eye in 1967, in a spoof diplomatic memo to describe the state of cabinet minister George Brown. It is now used as a stock phrase and euphemism to avoid litigation for libel, and the phrase has spread well beyond the magazine.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
PlainSpell is rendered directly from structured Wiktionary extracts and open word-frequency lists, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of September 2, 2026. Primary sources: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) and FrequencyWords.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.