Adorkable – it's in the dictionary but, please, don't ever say it out loud

Age: Seven and a bit.

Appearance: Zooey Deschanel, in a pair of glasses that she doesn't medically need, attempting to give you a friendship bracelet she made but falling on her bottom in the process.

Adorkable? What a horrible word. But it's a real word now. It's in the Collins English Dictionary and everything.

What does it mean? It's a blend of "adorable" and "dork". If you are socially inept in an endearing way, you're adorkable.

So if I wear pink earmuffs to a job interview? You're adorkable!

And if I've ever tried to assemble flatpack furniture with a Hello Kitty toy screwdriver? You're adorkable!

And if I've ever broken into a former partner's house so I could eat their food and sleep in their bed when they were out? It depends. Did you do it while wearing an ironic charity shop jumper?

Sure. You're adorkable!

And this word is in the dictionary because people actually say it out loud? Well, maybe not. Its inclusion is down to the fact that people use it on Twitter a lot, possibly to accompany a picture of a cat in an 1980s headband. There is a chance that the human body would explode with shame if anyone actually said it out loud.

Why is it popular? The first series of the US sitcom New Girl went out of its way to use the word as often as possible in its promotional material back in 2011. There was a backlash, and yet the word endured enough to be used as the title of a 2012 book by Sarra Manning.

Really? What's the book about? According to Amazon: "Jeane Smith's a blogger, a dreamer, a dare-to-dreamer, a jumble sale …"

That's enough. You do know that cutting off synopses of books about adorkable people is not adorkable, don't you?

Why am I starting to think that adorkable is only in the dictionary because it won a competition? Because it did. There was a poll on Twitter, and adorkable won it.

What came second? Felfie: a farmer selfie!

Oh, God. Felfies are adorkable!

Do say: "Your friend over there, absentmindedly picking his nose, is adorkable."

Don't say: "Isn't this just a polite way of saying 'developmentally challenged'?"