Barbecue Stoppers and Marmalade Droppers

[Music] You’re listening to “A Way with Words.”

I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette.

Well, unless you’ve spent the last few months in a galaxy far, far away, you know that this is an election year.

And that means we’re being barraged by even more political talk and punditry than ever.

Tons of it.

And I love collecting it, Martha.

Even the stuff that’s not related to the election year.

For example, do you know what hoghousing is in South Dakota?

I can’t say that I do.

Hoghousing in South Dakota?

Hoghousing.

It’s their slang term for when they’ve got a bill that’s all approved and then they gut it.

They rip out all the things that have been approved and they rewrite it to do something completely different.

It’s also known as a gut-end stuff in Oregon.

But, wow.

Well, is there any other political slang that’s catching your ear these days besides “fire it up”?

Well, you mean besides all the wordplay about the name Huckabee?

Oh, yeah.

Tons of that.

I mean, you could write a book just on play, you know.

Or a limerick.

Yeah, Huchenfreude was the one that I heard.

I like that.

There’s one that I like that they’re using on the right to talk about, you know, the very conservative people are talking about John McCain.

They’re saying that he is hisspandering.

That is, he’s pandering to Hispanics.

Whoa.

Yeah, not a very nice one.

We’ve also got horseracism.

Do you know what that is?

No.

It’s not bias against duns and palominos.

It’s just a term for the way the media covers politics.

It’s about the horse race, right?

They treat it like we’re watching the ponies at Belmont or Bay Meadows.

Oh, really?

Or Louisville.

Wow.

Yeah, I like that.

Horseracism.

Horseracism.

Yeah, and you’ve got the little pun in there about racism, right?

Absolutely.

That’s great.

Well, if you want to talk about political slang or grammar or slogans or language, give us a call.

The number is 1-877-929-9673.

Or email us.

The address is words@waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Kate in Indianapolis.

Kate in Indianapolis.

Well, hello, Kate.

What you doing?

I have a word that’s been a bone of contention between a friend of mine and I, and the word is moot.

Wait, before you go any further, is there money on the line?

No, there is not.

Dinner, respect?

Perhaps respect, self-confidence, those sorts of things.

Does the loser have to be a slave to the other person for a day or something?

We’ll see how it turns out, and then we’ll determine that.

I see.

Make the rules up later.

Good plan.

Good plan, Kate.

He’s adaptable.

Yeah, right.

Okay.

So, the word is moot.

M-O-O-T.

Correct.

Well, it’s been a standing debate for many years, actually.

This friend is a musician.

And when he uses what I think should be the word moot, he uses mute, M-U-T-E, in its place.

-huh.

Is he a trumpet player?

Does he stick a moot in his trumpet or something?

No, in fact, he’s a piano player.

He’s a piano player?

He’s a piano player.

Okay.

Okay.

He uses the mute pedal.

Yes, exactly.

He said, “Well, you know, it makes the sound less.”

And so it makes sense to me that in order for it to be an unimportant sort of thing or a less important thing, it’s a muted point.

Okay.

And what do you say, Kate?

I’m thinking that he’s completely wrong, that moot is the word.

And I even made up a little sentence to illustrate the point.

Oh.

Let’s hear it.

“Although the staff was quite perturbed, the fact that the trumpeter had forgotten to bring his mute was a moot point, as most of the residents of the retirement home were nearly deaf.”

That is very good.

You’ve used the word accurately in this sense.

So the short version of this is you’re the winner.

Yay!

Yay!

Congratulations.

It is not pronounced.

In that case, I think the slavery thing should be enacted.

Well, I hope you’ll be benevolent and you’re in…

Maybe you can make him serenade you or something.

Let’s just itemize all the ways your friend is wrong here.

It’s not mute.

It’s not mute.

It’s moot.

It is mute.

Okay.

And it has nothing to do with muting a musical instrument at all.

Okay.

And it’s not about that at all.

It basically means — it’s an adjective that means irrelevant or insignificant.

This is largely the North American usage, however.

There is a British usage, also used in the United States, so there’s two meanings that still don’t apply to what she’s talking about, that means debatable or indisputable or unresolvable.

But the use you’re talking about here is irrelevant or insignificant.

Great.

All right.

Well, I shall call him up and inform him of his new status.

Yep.

This is one of those things that’s…

It is indisputable that your friend is wrong, all right?

There’s no argument here.

Indisputable.

All right.

Well, thank you very much.

All right.

Stay warm.

You sound like you’re glowing from being right.

I am.

I am.

Absolutely.

The beauty that comes from being victorious.

I’m a good couple degrees warmer.

All right.

Thank you for your call, Kate.

Thank you.

Okay.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

I love this.

This reminds me of an episode of Friends, Martha.

Did you ever watch that when it was on?

Every once in a while.

Joey Tribbiani in the show is kind of a lovable goofball.

He’s not that bright, but he means well.

And there’s one episode where he says something like, “Does he like you?

All right?

Because if he doesn’t like you, this is all a moo point.”

And Rachel, played by Jennifer Aniston, says, “A moo point?”

And he says something like, “Yeah, it’s like a cow’s opinion.

It doesn’t matter.

It’s moo.”

A moo point.

A moo point.

That’s one of the funniest things.

I never watched a show that great, but they were running that particular bit as a promo for a while, and it cracked me up every time.

Oh, man.

We should try to find it on YouTube or something.

Yeah.

We’ll post it on the website, as always.

All right.

If you’re having a debate about a word, give us a call.

The number is 1-877-929-9673, or email us.

The address is words@waywordradio.org.

Hello.

You have A Way with Words.

Hello.

Hi.

Who is this?

This is Mariana from Argentina.

Hello, Mariana.

From Argentina.

From where in Argentina?

In Buenos Aires.

Oh, excellent.

Well, what are you calling us about today, Mariana?

Well, I’m calling about the word “love.”

L-O-V-E?

Yes.

So my question is this.

When I lived in the States, for me, it was strange that, you know, when people talked about friendship or to an acquaintance, and you feel a positive feeling about that person, the only word that was used was “love.”

And the fact is, in Spanish, we have many words for different degrees of love.

For example, for somebody you just met, like a slight acquaintance, you can say “lo estimo,” which is sort of a mellow kind of love.

And then you have a stronger, like “lo aprecio,” which is a little bit stronger than “estimar.”

And then you have, for a friend, you have “lo quiero,” which is a higher degree of love.

And then for, like, your partner or your kids or your parents, you have “te amo,” which is “I love you.”

So you have, like, four or five different ways of saying “love” instead of only one.

And, you know, I felt like an Eskimo trying to describe snow.

You make a good point, because in English we use “love” in so many different situations.

You know, “I love my children,” “I love microwave frozen lasagna.”

But that was what I was thinking of when you said “lo estimo” and “lo aprecio,” is that they’re roughly equivalent to the English words “esteem” and “appreciate,” but they’re not quite the same.

The nuance is a little different.

Martha, I think that I would say “I esteem you as a colleague, but I love you as a friend,” right?

Yeah.

And the “esteem” has that professional remover.

You would never really use that for even a friend or a family member.

But how about an acquaintance?

And you really enjoy their company, but you’re not so, you know, you don’t love them.

That’s a really good question.

I think that we’re a country of overstating the case.

We tend to love adjectives, and we use all the extreme and most powerful adjectives that we can to say something.

I would probably say “She’s great,” “She’s awesome,” “She’s fantastic,” “She’s fabulous.”

But you’re not describing how you feel about her.

I know.

You’re just describing her.

Right.

That’s exactly right.

I think we tend to be a little more removed.

It’s kind of related to that personal space, isn’t it?

We talk about our feelings about the object; we don’t talk about the object.

Because when you talk about appreciation, isn’t that about an object and not a person?

Well, it could be about a person, but I think what you’re pointing out is that in Spanish, maybe there are more gradations, almost like, I don’t know, like a scale or something.

We don’t have that quite so well defined in English.

I think we have it, but it’s hard to match the Argentinian Spanish scale to the North American English scale.

You could do a spectrum of words in English, and I would put them something like “respect,” “esteem,” “appreciate,” “to treasure,” “cherish,” “like,” “adore,” “love,” and I think there’s an increasing level of love there.

Actually, I feel very uncomfortable saying to a friend, “I love you.”

I never do.

Oh, really?

Oh, no.

What do you say?

Not in English.

Not in English?

What do you say in English?

Nothing.

I make them see that I love them, but I never say it, because I don’t feel comfortable using the word “love” for a friend.

I think you’re very American in that regard.

You’ve picked up that habit.

Oh, yeah.

North American.

North American.

I do tell certain people in my world that I love them, but it’s a very small group of people.

Yeah, but you would say “te amo” to even fewer.

That’s what I’m saying.

Yeah, that’s true.

You said something really nice, Marianna, and I think this is true in Argentina as much as it is in the United States, which is we express our love so often through our actions that sometimes the words aren’t necessary.

That’s right.

How we treat the other person, how we show respect for them and do things for them, right?

Right.

Yeah, well, Marianna, thank you for a very interesting call about nuance in language.

Thank you.

We loved having you on the show.

We cherish this call.

Thank you very much.

We appreciate the time you’ve spent with us.

We adore the fact that you called.

Okay, ciao.

Ciao.

Ciao.

Well, send us love from any country.

The address is words@waywordradio.org, or you can always call us.

The number is 1-877-929-9673.

Grant, I was nosing around your website, doubletongued.org, the other day, and I was looking for some examples of political slang, and you know, I saw an expression there that’s been around for a few years, but it seems more useful than ever these days, and that’s “barbecue stopper.”

Oh, yeah, that’s an Australian term.

It means a serious issue that causes people to stop what they’re doing so they can talk about it.

So if you bring something up, say, about the war or about some political scandal where people tend to be very polarized, and sometimes it’s used to mean a faux pas.

It’s when you bring up a subject that is verboten, especially in the company that you’re keeping.

Sort of like dropping a tray in a cafeteria and everybody just stops and turns around.

Yeah, it’s kind of like being at Nixon’s funeral and talking about Watergate.

Wow.

So a barbecue stopper, I love that, and not to be confused with a marmalade dropper.

What’s a marmalade dropper?

That’s something that you read in the morning paper that just causes you to drop your toast.

Oh, right, because it hasn’t passed what news people call the breakfast test or the Wheaties test.

Oh, what do you mean?

They try to make sure that the stuff in the morning papers or on the morning television shows isn’t going to gross you out or make you up-chuck.

Oh, yeah, I don’t think it’s so much a matter of up-chucking, it’s a matter of “Holy cow, did you see that, Ethel?”

All right, it’s like Chuck Shepherd’s News of the Weird.

Yeah, exactly, I guess.

Anyway, if you’ve got a question about words from near and far, you know, I’d love to talk to somebody about Australian English again.

I always love those calls.

We welcome them.

The number to call is 1-877-929-9673.

Or email us, we read everything, words@waywordradio.org.

Coming up on A Way with Words, a word puzzle from our quiz guy, and more of your calls.

You’re listening to A Way with Words.

I’m Martha Barnette.

And I’m Grant Barrett, and joining us once again is our quiz guy, John Chonesky.

Hello, John.

Hi, Grant.

Hi, Martha.

It’s great to be back.

How are you?

I’m doing really, really well.

What’s sticking out of your pocket there?

What is sticking out of my pocket?

A puzzle, I hope.

A quiz book or something.

Oh, that’s right.

Oh, it’s a quiz.

It’s a quiz in my pocket.

You brought us a quiz?

Well, you know, I’m a big fan of movies.

I get a lot of movies in the mail, and my wife and I sit and we watch movies at home, basically because with the two kids, we don’t get to go out anymore.

So we have a giant TV, and we make believe we’re watching the movies.

So we love movies.

Do you guys know what a movie tagline is?

I don’t know.

Is that like just when you thought it was safe?

Exactly.

And that’s exactly right.

The tagline is sort of the subtitle of the movie’s title.

One of the most famous taglines is the one you just mentioned for Jaws 2.

And if you would say it again, Martha, you were so good.

Oh, thank you.

Just when you thought it was safe to go into the library.

Go back into the water.

It’s A Way with Words, right.

No, just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water is Jaws 2.

Oh, back into the water.

That’s right.

Yeah.

I love it when studios get creative with their movie taglines.

For example, last summer there was a movie with the tagline, “One nation, underdog.”

No, that movie was underdog, naturally.

I thought that was an especially creative tagline.

And what’s cool about some taglines is that you don’t have to have seen the movie to figure out which movie it is.

You just need a flexible mind, which I think you both have.

I’m going to give you a tagline, and you try to figure out the movie title, and I’ll give you plenty of hints.

Are you ready?

Yep.

Okay, here we go.

The tagline is, “This summer, evil meets its moose.”

Oh, these are real taglines?

These are real taglines from real movies, yes.

Oh.

This evil meets its moose?

Was it the Rocky and Bullwinkle movie?

The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle, exactly.

A year 2000 mostly live action film based on the animated television show.

Right.

Big trouble for moose and squirrel.

Moose and squirrel.

Here’s the next one.

The tagline is, “See it with a bud.”

This has got- Could be any of a number of films, but- You’re right.

This has got to be- Selman and Louise.

No, Cheech and Chong something or other.

Oh, they’re kind of fun.

Smoke a big one or whatever the name of them was.

Okay, you’re in the general area, which is probably a parking lot, but I’ll give you some more clues.

The parking lot is a Grateful Dead concert.

That’s right.

This is a 1993 film that takes place in 1976 and chronicles the lives of high school and junior high students on the last day of school.

Oh, is Matthew McConaughey in that?

He is.

Yeah, what is the name of that movie?

Parker Posey, Anthony Rapp- Oh, I know the movie, but I can’t remember the title.

It’s blank and blank.

Because Matthew McConaughey plays the older kid who’s graduated who still hangs around the school.

He keeps hanging around the high school, yeah.

Oh.

I’ll have to throw the cards over on this one.

That’s dumb and dumber.

No?

That’s us.

It’s Dazed and Confused.

Oh, of course.

That’s it.

Also You, Dazed and Confused.

That was a great movie.

It was very good.

They just really nailed the period, and they just got it exactly right.

All right, let’s move on.

The tagline is, “His story will touch you, even though he can’t.”

Well, gee, I was going to say The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, no.

That’s a good guess, but The Diving Bell and Butterfly just came out, but this is a 19- I know.

That’s okay.

This is an Oscar-nominated 1990 film starring Johnny Depp.

Oh, Edward Scissorhands.

Oh, right, of course.

Edward Scissorhands, right.

The story will touch you.

I just watched his latest movie.

Even though he can’t.

The Sweeney Todd movie.

It was pretty good.

Sweeney Todd.

I enjoyed it very much.

He fits very well in those dark movies.

All right, let’s move on.

The tagline is, “Hear the pictures.

See the music.

Contains no dialogue.”

It’s another Disney film.

Is it Fantasia?

I don’t know.

It is Fantasia.

Oh, is it?

Okay, beautiful.

Not that I’ve seen it, but I’ve heard about it.

Hear the pictures, see the music.

Of course, if you see the movie with a bud, you could probably hear the pictures and see the music.

Any movie, you could hear the pictures and see the music.

All right, here’s another.

The tagline is, “You can run, but you can’t Hydra.”

Oh, my goodness.

Is there some Hercules movie or something?

That’s the movie.

It’s Hercules.

It’s the Disney film.

Is that Sylvester Stallone?

Who is it?

No, no, no.

This is the 1997 animated film.

All right, I got one more.

Here we go.

The tagline is, “Get back to your roots.”

Does it have to do with the hair?

Hairspray?

It is hairspray.

Is it?

Very good.

Right out of the gate.

Good going, Martha.

This is the 1988 movie musical, which became a stage musical.

It was remade into a movie musical in 2007.

Right.

I think the key here is you don’t have to have seen the movie.

You just have to like puns.

Yes, exactly.

If you’re a fan of wordplay, you will be a fan of- I like that movie, too.

Yes.

Is that it?

Is that all you got for us?

Good times.

We vanquished you, mister.

Yes, that’s a dozen.

You guys did very well, except for one.

I did get one out from underneath you.

We vanquished you, mister?

Yes, that’s what I said.

Is that another movie line?

No, that’s my line.

I speak like movies.

Hey, they call me Mr.

Quiz.

Call me Israel.

Very good.

Well, John, thank you very much.

Thank you, guys.

It was a pleasure.

We’ll see you soon.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

If you’re puzzling over a movie tagline or word origin or a point of grammar, give us a call.

The number’s 1-877-929-9673, or email us.

The address is words@waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Suzanne from Indianapolis.

Well, hello, Suzanne.

What’s going on?

Well, I have a question.

My husband and I have been obsessed with all of the election excitement, and there have been a lot of caucuses or cockeye, which may be a separate question about the plural about caucus.

Cockeye.

Yeah, I’m not sure about that, but our question is, after watching all of these caucuses and everyone talking about how they’re predominated by a lot of white people, is there a relationship between caucus and Caucasian?

Because I’m thinking, well, hello, if there is, of course they’re predominated by Caucasians, because that’s a related term.

Now, wait a second here, caucuses tend to be held in states that are mostly white anyway, right?

Well, yeah.

Yeah.

Is there a reason that caucuses are in predominantly white states?

Well, now that I don’t know, but I can tell you that the words aren’t etymologically related at all.

This is a pair of words that’s sort of like, you know, they look alike, they sound alike.

It’s sort of like bark on a tree and bark from a dog.

They have completely different roots.

They just happen to look like maybe they’re related.

The Caucasian part is pretty straightforward.

The area known as the Caucasus, the mountains that are between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea.

In the 19th century, a lot of theorists were suggesting that the race of fair-skinned people must have come from that area.

And so Caucasian got associated with fair-skinned people.

The caucus in this country, the political kind of caucus, that word has an origin that we’re not completely sure about.

It’s an Eastern Native American language, though, probably, right?

Like Algonquin or something?

That’s one of the theories, that it comes from a Native American word that means to advise or to talk together, to meet.

But we’re not completely sure that that’s the origin.

It may just come from something called the caucus club in the 18th century in Boston.

But the truth is that we can’t say for sure about the origin of the political caucus.

What is clear, though, is that it doesn’t have anything to do with the Caucasian race.

Wow.

Except that there are a lot of them.

Okay.

So I think we’re all safe now.

I’m feeling well because I was worried that there was going to be more tension around this issue.

So I’m feeling good about it.

Oh, good.

Good.

Well, I’m glad we could help you out there.

Yeah.

So disabuse anybody of that notion if they try to tell you that.

Okay, great.

Thank you so much.

All right.

Okay.

Thank you.

Take care.

Bye-bye, Suzanne.

Bye-bye.

Bye.

Well, if you’d like to caucus with us, give us a call.

The number is 1-877-929-9673.

Or email us.

The address is words@waywordradio.org.

Oh, political language, Martha.

I could talk to you about this all day.

Do you want some more?

Please.

There’s one that I came across recently called glass pockets.

Can you guess what those are?

Glass pockets?

Glass pockets.

Sounds like something on a Vietnamese restaurant menu.

Right, angel hair, something like that.

Glass noodles and stuff the shrimp in there, yeah.

No.

That’s not it.

Oh, I’m wrong?

No, no.

Oh, this has to do with politics, right?

Just this once, yes.

It has to do with politics.

Just this once, you’re wrong.

To have glass pockets means to spend money in a way that is transparent to the public, right?

Every dollar should be explained and accounted for.

It kind of goes along with the idea of the Sunshine Laws, which is supposed to make the internal workings of government accessible to the public.

That’s great.

I love it.

Well, if you picked up a word on the campaign trail that you’d like to share with us, give us a call.

The number is 1-877-929-9673 or email us.

The address is words@waywordradio.org.

And I just want to say don’t call us and just shout Ron Paul into the phone because it’s not going to do anything.

Yeah.

Stop doing that.

Hello.

You have A Way with Words.

Hi.

This is Carlton Bailey from Lakeside, California.

Go ahead.

What’s on your mind?

Probably the last year or so I’ve been hearing these probably radio ads mostly that refer to growing a business, and it just grates on me.

To me, if you’re going to grow something, you’re a farmer and you’re growing crops or you’re growing a lawn or flowers in your flower bed, but you increase a business.

You don’t grow a business.

And that just strikes you strangely, huh?

Yeah.

I know the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t matter to a hill of beans, but it just irritates me.

Isn’t there some kind of Gary Larson cartoon where somebody has a chicken farm and the guy is planting chickens in the ground?

I see you’ve got me.

And you’re talking about really growing your business.

Kind of the same idea.

Yeah, I know what you mean.

I’ve heard this more and more and more, and when I first heard it, Carlton, it drove me nuts.

For exactly the reasons that you said.

But you’ve changed your mind about it, is that what I’m getting?

I’m embarrassed to say that I used it the other day, Carlton.

Wow.

I’m sorry.

It just slipped out of my mouth, so I think it’s probably becoming more accepted.

And we do use agricultural terms.

Oh, because if Martha uses it, it’s okay.

I’m with you though, and I got to say, Carlton, I can see where it’s a problem, but you know what I like about it, Martha, and maybe this is why you’ve come around to it.

It’s just kind of nurturing or mothering, right?

It’s a little more about the human side of business, if you use a word like grow instead of the kind of dry.

Well, Grant, maybe we should say I’m suckling my business.

Or you’re watering your business and then reaping what you sow.

Yeah, I think there’s just something weird about using grow transitively for a business.

That’s what you’re saying, right, Carlton?

I guess so.

You know, like I say, it just doesn’t sound proper to me to grow a business, you know.

You don’t think of it as more humanizing?

Well, yeah, I think you’ve got to be alive somewhere, but a business, I’m not sure is alive.

But a business is made of people, and I think saying something like grow suggests the kinds of things that you mentioned about growing.

Doing crops or a lawn or anything with chlorophyll or anything that you might actually eat.

I don’t know.

It sounds, it’s less about robots or interchangeable parts or widgets.

Well, I suppose if you said, you know, we would like to help the business to grow.

All right.

Well, I’m sure we’ll get emails agreeing with you.

Yeah, we’re going to hear about this.

But you know what?

You’re welcome to gripe, and we’re glad to hear it.

Thank you for calling, Carlton.

Well, I’m glad to have a place to call.

All right.

Take care of yourself.

Call us anytime.

Bye-bye.

If you want to get something off your chest about language, the number to call is 1-877-9299673, or you can email us.

We do read all your emails.

The address is words@waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, my name is Estella, and I’m from San Diego.

Hi, Estella.

You’ve got a question about language, I’m guessing.

Yes, I do.

My husband and I were having a conversation with our son about words and about prefixes and suffixes, and we came across a problem that we couldn’t answer because we’re trying to homeschool.

And we noticed that certain words, like teacher and professor, they have different endings.

Like, they have ending for teacher or an OR ending for professor, and we’re trying to figure out how, why that is, and there’s other words like conductor or that end with OR and singer, which ends with

So how do you take these verbs and make them into, like, professions that people have, and how do you decide whether or not it’s an or an OR?

And I came up with this crazy idea that it has something to do with status or prestige of the career, that if you’re a professor, that’s more status than a teacher, so you would have an OR, and a teacher, having less status, would have an

But I came across an anomaly to my theory that, well, I’m going to say it, but I hope nobody is offended, but janitor ends with OR, and it’s not, you know, well, anyway.

So we’re trying to figure out how do you decide which is and which is OR?

What a very good question.

I don’t think I’ve had this question before, Martha, have you?

No, I don’t think so, I was going to say we’re radio announcers.

No, that’s okay.

But yeah, see, that’s an right?

I’m afraid it is, yeah.

Yeah, you know, I look at my paycheck every two weeks, and yes, it’s definitely an

Well, Stella, here I’ve got a couple of things, I’m going to throw something, you’re a teacher, you’re homeschooling your kid, you have one or two children?

I have two children, and actually I’m a professor by career.

So you’re a professor, and you have a couple of kids, so I’m going to be a little wonky with you and throw some language jargon at you, all right?

You ready for this?

Stand back.

All right.

The nouns that you’re talking about, for example, professor and teacher, are called agent nouns, and they have endings, the and the OR, that are called agentive suffixes.

What that means is the suffixes make words about people who do a specific thing, like “profess,” so to speak, or “to teach.”

Right.

Now, what you’ve done here, and by trying to determine whether or not status has something to do, whether or not the end with an is OR, is something, this is the third and final wonky term, is you’ve made a play with something we call “principle of contrast,” which is, we often, in our own minds when we’re trying to process language, we think that because words are spelled differently, or because a part of a word is spelled differently, that it must have a different meaning.

We work really hard to differentiate, and the truth is that there isn’t always a meaning that can be derived from spelling.

The OR and here actually mean exactly the same thing.

They just mean, they take a noun and they turn it into a person who does something.

That’s it.

There’s no, the status doesn’t have anything to do with it, all right?

So then why not just make it easy on everyone and just have it be for everything?

Well let me call up the English Language Academy and just bellyache those guys, because they’ve done a horrible job of making the—what a malformed beast we speak.

Well you know, I heard that there was, you know, that there’s Latin-based words, and then there’s German-based words, and there’s a status difference there, that certain words— Well, I don’t agree with that status difference, I don’t.

You’re onto something, though.

Generally, but not always, Latin-derived words, for example, those that end in A-T-E, like negotiate, will take an OR ending, and generally, but not always, those that we get from Middle English often have endings, but not always.

There are exceptions, for example, from the words that we get from the French, like restaurateur or entrepreneur, they end in E-U-R.

Doctor, right.

And then there are a few others, like beggar or peddler or liar, that end in A-R.

So we have some exceptions here, but generally, if you know the etymology of it, when you know that it’s got a Latin root, like professor, then you can be pretty sure that that’s why it takes an OR ending.

Yeah, but I’m all about etymology, and I think it’d be easier to just memorize those endings, you know.

Yes, yes.

I mean, that’s what we do, right?

Right, it is.

But, you know, I’m trying to teach my child to have some kind of conceptual understanding about things, and, you know, I’m like going, “Wow, well, why is it that certain words end with OR, and why others end with ?”

And I guess I should just go back and say, “Hey, just memorize it all.”

Well, it might be a way to teach a few lessons about etymology, to make a list of OR professions and a list of professions, and kind of look at those root words and say, “This one probably comes from the Middle English or the Germanic side, and this one probably comes from the Latin or Romance side.”

And you can kind of, like…

And then look them up.

That would be interesting.

Yeah, and it might be a way to actually have a lesson, instead of just memorizing stuff by rote, just to say, give a little background.

It might work.

Well, I hope we’ve helped you a little bit here.

We did.

Don’t forget that, in general, OR endings indicate a Latin etymology, and in general, endings indicate a Middle English or Germanic etymology.

Great.

Well, thank you so much.

All right, thanks for calling.

All right, bye-bye.

Take care of yourself, Estella.

Well, if you’ve got a question about professions and the words that they use, say jargon, for example, give us a call, 1-877-929-9673, and you can always email us.

We read everything, words@waywordradio.org.

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You’re listening to A Way with Words.

I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette.

And now it’s time for “Slang This,” the puzzle where you have to guess the meaning of some strange slang terms.

Today’s contestant is Jaime Hernandez from San Diego, California.

Welcome.

Thank you.

It’s great to be here.

Yeah?

As I’m really excited about participating, I’ve been looking forward to this.

All right.

Jaime, do you have a favorite slang term you’d like to share with us?

I do.

It’s an easy one.

It’s “tejo.”

It’s what?

T-E-H-O.

Tejo.

Do you know that one, Grant?

I don’t.

No.

Is that a Spanish word?

No.

Most people would think that.

However, we usually use it at home when we can’t decide what we want for dinner, if one of us is not as hungry, or if there are some nice leftovers from a restaurant, say, in the refrigerator.

Or we don’t feel like cooking, so we say, “Well, tonight let’s just ‘tejo’ it.”

And that means to each his own, so we don’t have to cook a big dinner.

That’s very nice.

Oh, that’s nice.

It sounded like “tevo.”

I was confused for a second there.

Tejo.

Yeah.

And it works.

It’s not even gender-specific, because a woman could say it as well.

Well, Jaime, let’s move on to our game.

Okay.

Grant’s going to give you a slang term, and then he’ll give you three sentences that suggest what that term could mean.

Now, only one of those examples will be real, and the other two are fake.

So, Jaime, your task will be to figure out which one of those three sentences illustrates how this particular slang term is actually used.

Now, chances are you haven’t heard the word before, so the trick will be to puzzle out its meaning, and I’ll be standing alongside you right here.

Okay?

Excellent.

All right.

Grant?

The first word is “karzi.”

K-A-R-Z-Y.

All right.

The first clue is, “The best way to avoid getting drunk at a wine tasting is to ‘karzi.'”

You sip, swish, taste, and then spit.

The second clue, “I went down to the karzi to do my business, but some bloke had stopped up the loo with the newspaper and the place was a mess.”

And the third clue, “Before the electric slide and the hokey pokey, the ‘karzi’ was the dance everybody wiggled to at weddings.”

So Jaime, is “karzi” a method of wine tasting, a bathroom, or a dance that used to be a regular part of weddings?

Ooh, what do you think?

That’s a tough one.

They all sound pretty good.

Have you ever done the “karzi” at a wedding?

No, if I did, I probably wouldn’t remember doing it.

What about the electric slide and the hokey pokey?

Yeah, that one I can handle, yeah.

I don’t know.

My first instinct was to go with the second one, but the first one sounds like it might be good as well.

Yeah, I know I’ve done a lot of wine tasting, but I’ve never heard that at the winery.

Or anywhere else.

So I’m going to follow my gut and go with the second one.

That’s right.

The answer is B, a bathroom, or a loo, or a lavatory.

And there were two clues in there that it’s a British word.

I used “bloke” and “loo” just so you could kind of get the idea that it’s not something that most Americans are going to know.

An interesting thing about this word is that there are a lot of spellings to it, tons of them.

It’s mainly an oral word.

So it’s also spelled “K-A-H-Z-I,” you know, because of the Brit, so they lead up the “R,” and so it sounds kind of optional, “K-A-R-S-E-Y.”

Lots of different ways.

All right, so we’ve got another one for you.

Are you ready?

Let’s go.

All right.

This expression is two words, and it’s “low bush moose,” L-O-W-B-U-S-H, one word, M-O-O-S-E, low bush moose.

Okay?

Okay.

And the first clue, “Out back of the hut were low bush moose, the rusting hulks of automobiles that had been left there long ago.”

Second clue, “Police say the young hunters made sport of shooting in the direction of other hunters to scare them, jokingly referring to them as ‘low bush moose.'”

And the third clue, “Buck didn’t come back with the big game we all expected.”

Somebody said, “It’s low bush moose again.

I am so sick of rabbit, I could eat my boots.”

So there are your three clues.

Are low bush moose rusting automobiles in a field, hunters who are shot at on purpose by other hunters, or rabbits?

The visual of the first one is making me wish that it was the correct answer, so I’m just going to go with that.

You’re saying that it’s the rusting automobiles in a field, they look like creatures out there in the underbrush.

What do you think, Martha?

What’s appealing to you about that?

I just saw a photograph once and it was really, really well taken.

It was of a rusted car in a field and with the oxidation of the rust and the flowers growing through it.

It was just a beautiful photograph and I remember that and that’s why I’m trying to make the connection.

Wow.

And then did you think, “Gee, that looks like low bush moose?”

No.

No.

But, well, let me analyze this, is the fact that you’re asking me, maybe that’s not the answer.

Oh, no.

Game theory is notoriously a bad way to play this quiz.

Game theory can serve.

Well, let me just say this, it’s been such a thrill just to be on the air with you both that whether I win or lose the second question doesn’t really matter.

This has been fun.

But am I right?

No.

Am I right?

No.

Unfortunately, it’s rabbits.

Rabbits, yeah.

It’s a term used in Alaska to refer usually to long-eared, or what is it, snowshoe rabbits actually.

Okay.

It’s a term used in a lot of book books from Alaska and it’s kind of a joking, jocular term.

Well, the term, the idea is that low bush, because rabbits are short, and low bush moose.

Sometimes when you go out with your gun, you don’t come back with a big beast.

You come back with something small but still edible.

Well, I’ve done jackalope honey, but I’ve never seen one of those.

Yeah.

There’s a term we’ve used in the past on another slang quiz that’s similar to this.

It’s the same kind of joking term and it’s slow elk, and these are cattle that have been rustled and shot and then carted away without the knowledge of the owner.

Okay.

Very similar.

So, anyway, you’re one for two, but the main thing was that we had some fun here, didn’t we?

We certainly did, yes.

This was fantastic.

Thanks.

Well, I mean, thanks so much for playing today, and for playing our game today, we’re going to send you a whole book of interesting terms that I know you’re going to love.

It’s Erin McKean’s book, Weird and Wonderful Words.

Perfect.

I’ll put it on the shelf with your books here at home.

That’d be great.

Fantastic.

If you have a question about language, give us a call.

The number is 1-877-929-9673.

Or email us.

The address is words@waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hello.

Forget about it.

Hey, Martha.

The radio show host.

Well, hello.

This is Thomas Corbetto calling from right outside the Bronx, New York.

All right.

We’re at right outside the Bronx, New York.

We’re actually White Plains, New York.

Oh, White Plains.

Oh, sure.

Yeah.

Yeah.

We’re busy all the time.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

That’s right up there on the beautiful Hudson River, up the river from the city, yes.

What’s on your mind, Thomas?

Well, I thought I’d start this off kind of comfortable with the whole forget about it.

But it’s kind of the same way that I would be speaking to my cousins at a family get together.

I’m this good Italian boy from northern Sardinia.

Love my heritage, but unfortunately, when my family came to America and we settled there right next to the good old Bronx, my family, my grandparents specifically, told their children to forget Italian and to speak English.

Oh, that old story.

What a sad story it is too.

It sure is.

And it seems to be a common theme among Italian families during that time anyway, when there wasn’t much tolerance for cultures and ethnicities and so forth.

So I don’t speak much Italian at all.

But when my Italian friends and family get together, when we’re together, I speak a completely different dialect than I’m speaking with you right now.

Really?

Yeah.

It’s like basically we reinvent the English language to suit our robust and colorful culture.

I must say that when I’m speaking in this way, though, I feel completely comfortable.

And it’s almost like a euphoria.

It makes me feel like I belong to something special.

Yes.

There we go.

Absolutely.

You guys should have heard the restaurant that I was in when Italy won the World Cup.

Forget about it.

Yeah.

Forget about it.

It’s a good place.

Absolutely.

So anyway, I do have a question for you two goombas.

All right?

Oh, there was a question.

Oh, we’re honorary goombas.

How about that?

You see that?

Well, it’s a goomba.

You’re a friend.

You’re a friend.

A friend that’s not connected.

A good person.

So it’s this thing of ours, that these two phrases that I want to get out is, number one, it’s forget about it.

Of course, we’ve heard that a million times.

Sure.

And also bada bing, bada boom.

Bada bing, bada boom.

It just happens like that.

So where do these tasty phrases originate, firstly?

And possibly how many issues can we address with each one of them?

And finally, is this just a New York and Northern Jersey phenomenon, or do these colorful phrases find their way into Italian-American vocabulary all over the country?

Wow.

Holy moly, you asked for a dissertation.

I think I could do a whole semester’s course on this topic.

Forget about it.

Forget about it.

Forget about it.

No, don’t even think about it.

I’ll tell you something.

I’ll tell you something right now.

Forget about it.

We can take care of that one really quickly.

That’s not specific to Italian-Americans.

There are a lot of Italian-Americans that use it.

It is often used by Italian-Americans in TV and film, but it’s specific to New York.

And these kind of mushed-together words were recorded as far back as the 1930s by field workers for the Works Progress Administration.

They have this whole list of stuff.

Some of them are kind of jokey and not authentic, but this idea that we talk fast in New York and that we lose the space between our words so that sentences become single words, it’s been chronic for, what is that, 80 years now.

It’s really kind of incredible.

Wow.

That is awesome.

Yeah.

So forget about it.

It actually isn’t on the list that I know from the 1930s, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it dates to about that part, all right?

So in any case, what’s really interesting is that when you go look at the movie’s popular culture television, like, say, the books by Mario Puzo or Nicholas Pileggi, or the movies, you know, Goodfellas, Godfathers, Casino, that sort of thing, you’ll find that they use this kind of language that these two authors, Puzo and Pileggi, took out of their life in New York City in the 1930s.

And they made it seem like everybody was using that language, but yet it really only belonged to them and their people.

You know what I’m saying, Thomas?

And so they started using it and saying, “Well, this language belongs…”

And everyone else outside just assumed that all Italian-Americans use that language.

And so you’ll find these words and these sayings just kind of spreading that way.

It’s really interesting.

So you’re saying that Italian-Americans are picking up expressions like that from literature?

Yeah, yeah.

It’s a weird self-reinforcing loop where these small little bits of language that really only belong to a small group of Italian-Americans actually are made bigger by popular culture.

And other Italian-Americans may even very well pick them up the same way that any normal American would because they sound interesting and they’re kind of cool.

Well, bada bing, bada boom.

Just to close though, I do want to talk about bada bing for just a second.

When we say bada bing, bada boom, most Americans picked it up from Sonny in the movie Godfather, right?

Yeah.

Most of us didn’t even know it.

I’m not even sure that it was in the original book that Puzo wrote.

I don’t know.

I’ve written a little bit about this, but I didn’t look that up.

I’ll tell you though, it’s actually two separate phrases that have come together in that phrase.

Really?

Yeah.

Bada bing is one and bada boom is another.

And they kind of go together and they serve the same purpose.

But bada bing we can trace to 1972, but bada boom we can chase to 1957.

And they are both distinctly Italian-American.

Wow.

That’s amazing.

And is it what I think it is?

Like bada bing, it just happened, like it just appeared in front of me.

Yeah.

It’s kind of like think about a gunshot or think about a riff on a drum.

It’s kind of like a ta-da or a there it is or a voila.

Bada bing.

That’s great.

All right.

Well, Thomas, we’ve covered a lot of ground here and I hope we’ve done some justice to these big issues that you want to do to address.

You have.

You absolutely have.

And I thank you guys very much for addressing this for me.

And by all means, you know, I work at a big hospital and everyone in this entire hospital is going to hear this show and hopefully it’ll turn them on to be regular listeners.

Wow.

There’ll be miracles in the critical care ward.

Absolutely.

Indeed.

Thomas, that sounds like an offer we can’t refuse.

Oh, thank you.

Thanks a lot.

Great.

Thanks a lot for calling.

Awesome.

Have a great weekend.

Take care.

All right.

Take care of yourself.

Bye-bye now.

Bye-bye.

We welcome calls about all kinds of language in the United States, including the dialect of people who are from somewhere else.

That’s actually some of the stuff that we enjoy getting into the most.

Love it.

So we welcome your calls about the language that your parents and your grandparents spoke.

Give us a ring, 1-877-929-9673.

And you can send us emails.

Take as long as you want to write it out and we’ll read everything.

Words@waywordradio.org.

Hello.

You have A Way with Words.

Hello.

This is William from Fort Worth, Texas.

Hello, William.

How are things in Fort Worth?

Good.

Yeah?

Like weather today.

Yeah?

All right.

What’s up?

Well, your recent show on family terms brought to mind the phrase that my mother and her mother always used, and it was “second joint.”

And that’s what they called the thigh of the chicken.

Oh, the thigh of the chicken.

And as long as I was a child and throughout the years, they always referred to it that way and I had never heard anybody else refer to it that way until one day I caught a very old cooking show on PBS featuring Justin Wilson.

The kitchen chef, the kitchen cook, what did he call himself?

Okay.

Exactly.

He was like, “You put a little onion in there and then you put a little wine.”

He always like poured lots of wine in there.

Alguarantee.

Alguarantee.

Put a little onion in there, a little wine in there.

And he also referred to the thigh as the second joint.

Oh, interesting.

And I had never heard anybody outside of my family use that term.

That’s always a thrill, isn’t it, or startling when you hear something like that.

Yeah, and it brought back all those memories of, “Wow, that’s our family word.

Where did that—how did you get a hold of that?”

And so does your family hail from Texas?

Your mother and your grandmother are from Texas as well?

Yes, they were from the Houston area, which made me think, “Well, maybe it’s a regionalism.”

Texas and Louisiana then.

Yes.

I’ve never heard that, Grant.

Have you?

Oh, yes.

I mean, besides the caging guy?

Yeah.

We didn’t use it in my family, but I know this from—don’t laugh at me—from reading the Dictionary of American Regional English as a pastime.

And there’s nobody—everybody’s like, “Well, of course.

You big goober.”

You know what, William?

It’s in there.

It’s in there.

The Dictionary of American Regional English, when they sent out their questioners in the 1960s, a lot of words came back that had to do with food, and they were able to not only in their survey get a lot of people who said it from around the country.

It’s not regional, really.

It seems to be used just a little bit everywhere by somebody.

But they were able to do a little digging in books and take it back to the 1850s.

So it’s got some history, too.

However, I know for a fact that it’s a little older than that still.

You can find it in cookbooks from the 1820s, second joint meaning thigh.

Now, why they called it that, I’ve got two ideas for you.

The first one is that the second joint on the leg of a chicken kind of corresponds to our knee, right?

Either it’s the second joint away from the body or the second joint up from the foot.

Right.

But the theory I like better, and the reason I remember this entry about second joint from the Dictionary of American Regional English is that there was one of the citations in there where they quoted a person that they spoke to her, they interviewed her, and she said that she thought that the reason that they called it second joint in her family is because it was a little improper to use the word thigh.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

Now, I don’t know if that’s true or not, but I have known some people in my time where certain words were off limits because they might refer to something that was a little too intimate on the human body.

And my grandmother was a proper southern lady.

Oh, was she now?

-huh.

William, did your grandmother have a word for the tail part, you know, the kind of fatty part?

Oh, yes.

That’s the parson’s nose.

The parson’s nose.

Very good.

Have you heard that one, Grant?

Yes, in fact.

Isn’t it sometimes called the pope’s nose?

Sometimes the pope’s nose, sometimes the parson’s nose, and I love the term for this in French.

Oh, I don’t know that one.

It’s “les solilles,” which means “only a silly person won’t eat it.”

I’m just picturing your family sitting around eating parson’s noses and second joints.

Yes.

Well, I guess everybody has lots of terms for food because they’re so important.

Indeed.

Well, William, we’ve given you a little bit of history for the term.

We showed you that it’s not just in your family.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to be regional like you guessed, but that’s okay.

You’ll find that there are plenty of other people that know the term, too.

Well, that’s good because it’s been a long time since I’d heard anybody use it.

All right.

Well, thank you so much for your call, sir.

Thank you for taking my call.

All right.

Bye-bye.

All right.

Best of luck.

Well, Martha, you know, he has made me hungry.

I was thinking of my mom’s fried chicken.

She does some good stuff with chicken, and then my father’s mashed potatoes all buttered up.

Oh.

Oh.

Oh.

Oh.

Or dinner.

-oh.

You and I have a food problem.

We welcome your recipes and your pictures of fried chicken to Words@waywordradio.org, and we’ll take your calls about language 1-877-929-9673.

Well, that’s our show, but if you’re pondering a point of grammar or you’re curious about a word, leave us a phone message anytime, night or day.

The number is 1-877-929-9673.

Or send us an e-mail to Words@waywordradio.org.

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A Way with Words is produced at Studio West in San Diego.

I’m Martha Barnette.

And I’m Grant Barrett, inviting you to join us next time.

That’s right here on A Way with Words.

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