Gesturcons
It has come to my attention that the expression "ah" has approximately eleventy billion different meanings. In face to face conversation, the intention is usually narrowed down to a handful of partially related meanings by the accompanying physical gestures. Typically, the context of the utterance is then enough to allow the listening party to pare the candidates down to something quite similar to the voicing party's intent.
This process does not translate well to written communication.
I propose a supplementary method of written expression when using the onomatopeia of sounds made during speech. Words like "ah", "oh", "ha" and "huh" shall optionally, but usually, be suffixed with one of the following characters:
^ for shock, surprise
v for deep thought, disdain or skepticism
w for incredulousness or disbelief
/ for playfulness or jest
These symbols arrive, naturally, from the shape of the eyebrows and brow one typically displays when expressing the relevant emotion. The images suggested by the symbols are raised eyebrows, furrowed eyebrows, eyebrows squeezed together and one eyebrow raised, respectively.
A few examples of the resulting "gesturcons" follow. It is beneficial to mimic the gesturcon with your own eyebrows, as you read the sentence.
"huh^ what just happened? Did I just pass out?"
"ahv, I really don't think you should be doing that!"
"mmmw You sound like you're spinning me a pile of bovine crap."
"oh/ Does that mean I'm going to get a spanking now?"
Starting to get the picture?
Alternative names for these devices include "gesticons", "expressicon", "kinesicons", "suggestymbol", "sigbol" and "synmbol".