When Sean in New York City contemplated telling his boss he wasn’t coming into work the next day, he texted a friend that he might bang out sick. He wonders about the phrase, which he picked up from his father, a police dispatcher in New York City. The more common expression is bang in sick, although both variants are used. In his 2006 book The Official Dictionary of Unofficial English (Amazon), Grant traced the phrase back to the 1980s, although he’s since followed it back to the 1960s. It’s particularly common among firefighters, police officers, and other civil servants in New York, Boston, and other cities along the U.S. East Coast. This is part of a complete episode.
What makes a great first line of a book? How do the best authors put together an initial sentence that draws you in and makes you want to read more? We’re talking about the openings of such novels as George Orwell’s 1984...
To slip someone a mickey means to doctor a drink and give it to an unwitting recipient. The phrase goes back to Mickey Finn of the Lone Star Saloon in Chicago, who in the late 19th century was notorious for drugging certain customers and relieving...
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