THE FIRST WORD

caboodle

PRONUNCIATION:

(kuh-BOOD-uhl) 

MEANING:

noun: The lot, collection, or crowd.

NOTES:

The word is mostly seen in the expression "kit and caboodle" meaning "the whole lot".

ETYMOLOGY:

Perhaps from boodle (money, goods, people), from Dutch boedel (property). Earliest documented use: 1848.

USAGE:

"New York City teems with questionable urban legends. But the fable about the postal clerk and his wife, a Brooklyn librarian, scrimping to amass an astounding collection of modern art, cramming all 5,000 pieces in a rent-controlled one-bedroom apartment, then donating the whole kit and caboodle to the National Gallery of Art in Washington and galleries in all 50 states, is true."
Douglas Martin; Herbert Vogel, Fabled Art Collector, Dies at 89; The New York Times; Jul 24, 2012.