There was an episode of House where his patient was a teenage Roma boy, and House made a point of using "gypped" in his presence a few times just to get him annoyed.

IIRC, he only used the term once (loudly), near the end of the episode; he was deliberately provoking the boy's parents to distract them and let his team sneak into the boy's room to do... something I don't remember. That was back when his jerkish actions generally had some kind of purpose. (Not always a good purpose, granted.)

I've been thinking all day, and not come up with a workable alternative to "crazy" that isn't of similar derivation ("insane", "nuts", etc). Any suggestions for an alternative word for usages in sentences like, "I realized that the plan was _______ when the diagram included hippos with hummus."

"I realized that the plan was _______ when the diagram included hippos with hummus."

Irrational? Unhinged? Defective? Fucked Up?

I think unhinged is like crazy--a word used to describe craze, without being a medical definition. If one's banned, I can't see the other being allowed. Although I think banning the one is touchier than I'm ever going to get.

I'm sure someone can make a case against irrational, but they'd be pretty...fucked up.

"I realized that the plan was _______ when the diagram included hippos with hummus."

Out of hand.

I get why crazy could be bad, but like debetesse, I have trouble thinking of alternatives, especially when you are saying things like "crazy in love" or "crazy busy".

I also keep thinking of all the songs I love that feature the the word crazy prominently.

Also the plan with the hippos is a very silly plan.

I have been writing "craxy" thinking that makes it OK but it bugs me when Dan Savage uses "leotarded" as a cutesy alternative to "retarded" so now I'm not so sure.

Wack-a-doo?

Whacky comes from british slang and probably refers to someone who has been hit on the head a lot.

(It's spelt 'wacky'. Don't know the etymology.)