spongy

Etymology

sponge + -y

adj

1. Having the characteristics of a sponge, namely being absorbent, squishy or porous.
   spongy earth; spongy cake; spongy bones
   […] there were times when she would lie looking at her, with such a still, watchful, almost dangerous expression, that Helen would sigh, and change her place, as persons do whose breath some cunning orator had been sucking out of them with his spongy eloquence, so that, when he stops, they must get some air and stir about, or they feel as if they should be half-smothered and palsied. 1861, Oliver Wendell Holmes, chapter 28, in Elsie Venner, volume 2, Boston: Ticknor & Fields, page 246
   It was easy to realise, too, the need for the overall 40 m.p.h. speed limit; apart from the spongy nature of much of the track bed, the [West Highland] line suffered considerably in the Arctic conditions of last winter, from which it has not yet fully recovered. 1964 January, Cecil J. Allen, “Locomotive Running Past and Present”, in Modern Railways, page 52
2. Wet; drenched; soaked and soft, like sponge; rainy.
   Her who still weepes with spungie eyes, And her who is dry corke, and never cries; I can love her, and her, and you and you, I can love any, so she be not true. 1633, John Donne, “The Indifferent”, in Poems, London: John Marriot, page 200
   It rains […] most of the fall and winter and much of the spring. It’s a spongy sky you’ll be wearing on your head. 1961, Bernard Malamud, A New Life, Penguin, published 1968, page 21
3. (slang) Drunk.