Words I'm Looking Up (One in an occasional series on words I'm looking up)

"helluva"

adj. Slang Used as an intensive: He's a helluva great guy.
Alteration of 'hell of a.' -- American Heritage Dictionary

* adj. phonetic sp. of 'hell of a' -- Webster's New World College
Dictionary

Take that anyone who believes that words don't evolve from misuse and misspellings.

* Asterisk stands in for the little star Webster's uses to denote an "Americanism." If only I had a British English dictionary I'd check under "b" for "bloodyhelluva."