Luftmensch
LOOFT-mensh • Noun
לופֿטמענטש
An impractical dreamer; literally an 'air-person' with their head in the clouds and no visible means of support.
Not a lazy person, but someone whose brilliant, sweeping ideas are totally unmoored from reality. They are writing a three-volume space opera instead of paying their gas bill.
Rhymes with 'hooked-bench' if you replace the first vowel with an 'oo' sound. Keep the 'Looft' short and airy.
Standard YIVO transliteration: luftmentsh
Etymology: Literally 'air-person.' Coined in Yiddish literary circles to name an entire economic archetype of the late-imperial Pale.
"He doesn't have a job, but he's a luftmensch—always planning to strike gold in the wilderness."
"He's been pitching 'Uber for hamsters' to angel investors for a year without writing a single line of code. Total luftmensch."