Can of Worms

You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.

I’m Martha Barnette.

And I’m Grant Barrett.

I was reminded again this week that in English we have a lot of these cute little phrases that we use to exchange words with strangers.

Things that we say like, hot enough for you, or have a nice day.

But the thing that they say to me now, now that I keep my head basically bald, is things about my baldness.

I was at an outdoor concert here in San Diego, beautiful weather, but sunny.

So I put some sunscreen on the top of my head, which is basically bald.

Yeah, that’s a good idea.

Good practice.

And a fellow comes up to me and asks to borrow the sunscreen.

And then he said to me something like, what was on top has left and I can’t get it back.

What’s on my back is all that’s left.

To which I replied, a busy road grows no grass.

And then he replied, it’s a solar panel for a sex machine.

And so it turns out, if you Google this, there are a ton of these expressions that bald people become accustomed to saying.

Because people can’t stop commenting on the state of your head.

It’s like it’s the male equivalent of being pregnant.

They can’t not say anything.

They feel compelled.

Do they want to help?

What I should have said, and this is one of my favorites, God only made so many perfect heads.

The rest he covered in hair.

So there’s a ton of this stuff.

Well, Grant, are you considering going to the Bald is Beautiful convention in Moorhead, North Carolina?

Moorhead City?

I’m not committed to making it a lifestyle.

It’s just my hair.

I don’t invest a lot of personality into my hair.

But I wanted to share a quote with you that I found when I was Googling bald expressions and bald funny lines.

And this is from Jorge Luis Borges, who was talking about the 1982 Falklands War between the U.K. and Argentina.

And he said, it’s a fight between two bald men over a comb.

Oh, that borehase. That’s perfect.

I’d love to hear your expressions, the things that you say when people comment on your baldness or anything else about your body when they talk about your height or your shortness or your pregnancy.

You have these pat expressions. Pass them along.

words@waywordradio.org or 877-929-9673.

Hi, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Sharon Stone.

Hi, Sharon. Welcome to the program.

Not the Sharon Stone.

Is this Grant?

It is Grant, yes.

Well, I am the Sharon Stone, to those who know me well, but as my mother says, my name got famous before I did.

So there you have it.

Well, hi, Sharon.

This is the Martha Barnette.

The one.

Hi, Martha.

Great to hear from you guys and gals.

So, Sharon Stone, what can we do for you?

Well, I have this expression.

It just came up a few weeks ago, and my mom passed it along to me, but it came from her dad, my grandfather.

My late grandfather, and he had a lot of them, but this was one I’d never heard before, and the expression is floor flusher.

And the way my mom used it, actually, it’s a little embarrassing, but being a single gal, I had a prospective suitor, and he sounded too good to be true, and my mom said, I hope he’s not a floor flusher, and it turns out I think he was a floor flusher.

But I had never heard the expression, and she said, should I tell you what she said it meant?

Yeah, sure.

To kind of give you the guidance.

She had said it’s, you know, somebody who purports to be one thing when in actuality is really not.

So kind of a phony or a fake or a fraud.

I didn’t know where it came from, and that was actually the first time I had heard her speak that, but she said that was a big expression with my grandfather, floor flushers.

And Sharon, you’re saying floor, like F-L-O-O-R, flusher?

Yes.

Floor flusher.

Okay.

Well, that’s interesting.

Let me ask you something.

Did your grandfather play poker by any chance?

Oh, gosh.

I don’t know.

I wouldn’t have been surprised if he did, because I know my grandfather was a kind of well-dressed, kind of flashy guy.

And I know his tailor, who we actually shared, it was Wayne Newton’s tailor, Ortiz.

So I know he had spent a lot of time in Vegas.

And I know my grandparents used to go to Vegas back in the day.

Okay, okay.

Before I was around.

The picture is becoming clearer.

It actually goes back to a term, four-flusher, F-O-U-R.

Because if you’re playing poker and you have a flush, you have five cards of the same suit.

If you have a four flush, then that’s just four cards of the same suit, which isn’t very useful.

Right, but it’s a position which you might be bluffing, right?

Yes, exactly.

And so a four flusher is somebody who flushes.

Is floor flusher, is that a…

Floor flusher?

I don’t know that I’ve ever heard it is floor flusher.

Oh, yeah, yeah, I have.

Gosh, you solved this so easily when it seems like such a mystery to me.

Yeah, well.

Just take the L out.

That’s what you do.

That’s what you do.

Aren’t you supposed to make it look a little more difficult?

So is there a floor aspect to it, or is that just where the word kind of got misconstrued, as we like to say, as it came along?

Yes, the word was misconstrued.

Yes, it was misconstrued.

You know who I think really helped popularize it was Popeye.

Did you remember the old cartoon with Popeye and olive oil and Brutus?

How could I not?

Bluto?

Well, there’s one cartoon where Popeye and Bluto are competing for the affections of olive oil, which they always do.

And this time they’re doing it by trying to solve her plumbing problem.

And, of course, all these terrible things happen, you know, water flying everywhere and flooding of the house.

And at one point she says to them, don’t touch me, you floor flusher.

And it’s a joke, you know?

-huh. Okay. Wow.

And so I think it would be easy to misconscrew that term, four-flusher, meaning to bluff.

But the original term four-flusher comes from poker, from somebody who was bluffing.

They didn’t have the hand.

Right, they didn’t have that flush.

But they were trying to take the pot anyway, right?

Right.

Sharon, this is great.

Thank you so much for calling.

Good luck in dating world.

Well, thank you guys so much.

Oh, yeah.

And I will definitely be listening, and it’s always a lucky day when I hear you guys.

All right.

Take care of it now.

Watch out for those four-flusher.

Thank you so much.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Okay, I shall.

877-929-9673 is the number to call to ask your questions about language.

On our Facebook page, Lindsay Klaus asked, which is the correct phrase, dull as ditch water or dull as dish water?

And, you know, this was one of these things where I looked at it and thought, well, how can Lindsay not know this?

It’s dull as dishwater.

But you know what?

You go back.

It’s ditchwater.

It’s ditchwater.

I had no idea.

And a lot of people chimed in and posted links to different dictionary entries.

And sure enough, dull as ditchwater is a much earlier phrase and more common.

How about that?

How about that?

877-929-9673.

Hello.

You have A Way with Words.

Hi.

My name’s Maureen.

I’m in Berlin, Maryland.

Hi, Maureen.

Welcome to the show.

Hello, Maureen.

Well, I’m curious about something.

Growing up and since I’ve called the extreme rear, I guess the cargo area of a station wagon, and I know there aren’t many of them still on the road, but I’ve got one, the way back.

And I always called it that.

And when I use that term with my kids, they laugh at me and say, which is nothing new, by the way, but they laugh at me and say no one else calls it that.

And I’m wondering, is that true?

Or is it something my family made up calling it the way back?

Or is that something that’s actually out there in legitimate phrase?

In which case, ha, my kids.

Since when have you been using the term?

Childhood.

Back when more people drove station wagons than do now.

70s, 80s?

Thank you.

I don’t know.

Well, like 60s.

60s, okay.

And, you know, pre-seatbelts, so you would sit back there.

That was like the prized place to set on a long family trip because nobody could reach you.

Right, exactly.

Well, Maureen, do you have something riding on this? Do the kids have to do chores for a week if you’re right?

Oh, man, why didn’t I plan for this? No, no such luck.

Nothing, huh? Well, a mother’s gloating can be very powerful.

That’s true. And trust me, I know how, and they know that, so it’ll work.

So you’re telling me it’s actually something. Yeah, Martha’s about to equip you fully for motherhood here.

Well, I don’t know about that, but you’re right. I mean, I’ve heard Wayback used.

I don’t know. Oh, really? Yeah, yeah.

I don’t know that there’s any particular regional. From your childhood?

Yes. Okay. Yes.

Yes, we didn’t use it. Yeah, you’re welcome. We didn’t use Wayback.

We did have a station wagon, but we called it the Backback 2. The Backback?

No, the Backback 2. Oh, the Backback 2.

Put it in the Backback 2. And the only reason we did is because that was a family word.

My little brother just decided that it was the Backback 2. Like T-W-O, T-O-O?

He couldn’t spell. Probably before he could spell, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But the backpack, too. I mean, I will always, forever, refer to the last part of the station wagon as a backpack, too.

But you do see way back from time to time. In fact, it’s in your double-tongued dictionary online on our website.

That’s right, yeah. Your collection of slang.

I found a citation for it, as a matter of fact, and I was kind of surprised, and so I recorded it.

Did a little noodling around and found that people are reporting having used this in their childhoods from the 60s and 70s.

It’s not incredibly common. It shows up in some specialty dictionaries like Paul Dixon’s family words.

But even there, he reports, though, that numerous families report it.

Yeah. So they think that it’s their own family word, but it’s actually more widespread than that.

Yeah. Cool, right?

So you’re telling me that it was our family, so we’re not so special.

You’re still special. You’re very special.

I know, I know. I’m teasing.

But you’re part of a small group of people that use the word way back. If you had people who use the word way back convention, it would not fill a small town.

It would be a lot of station wagons. There would be lots of station wagons in the parking lot.

That’s right, or estate cars, as the British call them.

Maureen, there were five kids in my family. Growing up, my mother had a pinto.

And I swear she and the five of us would cram in there on Avon runs. And I would be the one in the back.

Avon runs! And I was the tallest one!

I don’t know how that worked out that way, but I called it the hatch area because I’m like, in the back of this bright red pinto.

No, green pinto, it was a green pinto. And I was under the big window.

But I think it was my space. I owned it. And that was kind of the nice thing about it.

I didn’t have to have brotherly elbows or sisterly feet poking me. Well, there were five of us, too.

And I’m really glad we had a station wagon now that you mentioned all this.

So, Maureen, you can go back to your kids and tell them you’re right and we said so.

Yeah, definitely. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it.

Yeah, take care, Maureen. Thanks for calling. Take care, guys.

Bye-bye. Bye-bye.

And we’ve got to put the word out. Since Wayback is so rare, we’ve got to ask everyone else, do you use Wayback to describe the back of a station wagon or a minivan?

I have seen it used for a minivan. Yes.

The area in the back where you put the groceries or the luggage, that sort of thing.

Yeah, the part that’s way back in the vehicle. The part that’s way back.

If you use that, give us a call, 877-929-9673. Tell us what is wrong with your family.

No, I mean, tell us exactly why you use it, when you use it, where you live, that sort of thing.

And while you’re at it, send us an email, words@waywordradio.org.

Speaking of baldness, did you know that the name Calvin means bald? It comes from the Latin word calvis.

It means bald and is related to the Spanish word calvo, which also means bald.

Very interesting. I did not know that. Yeah. Calvin.

877-929-9673 or email words@waywordradio.org. Way more word wrangling and a word quiz coming up.

Stay tuned. Support comes from the Ken Blanchard Companies, celebrating 35 years of making a leadership difference with Situational Leadership 2, the leadership model designed to boost effectiveness, impact, and employee engagement.

More about how Blanchard can develop your executives and leaders at KenBlanchard.com slash leadership.

You’re listening to A Way with Words. I’m Martha Barnette.

And I’m Grant Barrett, and we’re joined by the king of the quiz frontier, John Chaneski.

Hello, John. Hi, Grant. Hi, Martha.

It’s not that wild anymore. I left wild off. I’m going to take my quiz king crown off for a second.

It’s kind of chafing a little bit, but things are good here. They make coonskin caps bigger than that.

That’s right. Coonskin crowns, as it were. Sure.

You know, guys, it’s about that time of year again. It’s time to crown not Miss America, not Miss Universe, but Miss Word.

Oh, thank you. Yes, Miss Word. Thank you. I hope it matches my shoes.

Martha, you’re the incumbent, aren’t you? Now, you may argue that pageants are all popularity contests, and that’s okay because that’s exactly what this one is.

I’ve entered several famous trios of words into a commonly used search engine to see which ones get the most hits.

For example, I searched for the words bacon, lettuce, and tomato and recorded their hits.

Now, can you rank all three of these terms according to how well they did?

Oh, wow. Oh, nice. Yeah?

So you’ve got a pat-set phrase and we’re supposed to rank them. Yeah.

Okay. I have a guess for number one. Bacon is way out in front.

Bacon, it’s so far in front. Yeah, that would be my guess. The other words look like Pluto.

That’s my guess as well. Tomato second and then lettuce. I’ll rank at number one.

Yep, that’s where I would go. You want to go bacon, tomato, lettuce. Bacon TL.

Yes. You are correct. Bacon, $178 million. Tomato, $164 million. Not shabby.

And lettuce at a $49.4. Wow, bringing up the rear.

Now, let’s see how our other contestants did. Ready to go?

Yeah. Okay. Lock, stock, and barrel. Lock, stock, and barrel.

Okay. Oh, stock has to be way out in front. That would be my guess.

Lock, second, and barrel, third. That’s my guess as well.

That is correct. Stock at $3,480,000,000. Lock at a paltry $757,000,000. And barrel, $192,000,000.

So stock in the lead. Very good. How about hook, line, and sinker?

Line. Yep. When you say Martha, yeah. And then hook.

Yep. And then sinker. That’s where I would go.

Say it again? Sorry. Line, hook, sinker in the order of popularity?

That is exactly correct. Yep. Line way out in front.

How about bell, book, and candle? Bell, book.

Okay. I have a guess. Me too. Okay. Grant, why don’t you go first?

Book by 100 million. Bell and then candle. That’s exactly where I was going.

That is exactly correct. Yes, book was way out in front and then bell and candle.

How about snap, crackle, pop? Ooh. Or snap, crackle, soda, as they say in some parts of the country.

Snap, crackle, dad. Okay, that’s going to be. Okay, I got to guess.

I would guess pop is first, snap is second, and crackle is third. Same here.

Grant concurs, and you are both right. Booyah.

Very tight race there for pop and snap, but crack all the way down on the bottom.

Now it’s time to crown Miss Word. Here are the three words that scored the highest hits.

Can you rank them in order? Okay, the highest. Line, book, stock.

Line, book, and stock? Right. Oh, this is where it gets really tough.

Stock. Just because. Yeah. I’m thinking of business stock.

I’m thinking of cattle stock. I’m thinking of the verb and the noun. I’m thinking of financial stock.

Okay. I’m going to go with book. That can be a verb as well. Book your flight.

So one of these is going to be in tears. One of these words is going to be crying.

Well, you’re both going to be in tears because our 2012.

I did it again.

Our 2012 misword is line.

No, are you serious?

Yes.

Line has $5,130,000, book has $4,720,000, and stock has $3,480,000.

Congratulations to Miss Line.

So congratulations to all our contestants.

And congratulations to Grant and Martha.

You both did pretty well on that.

Thanks, John, though, anyway, for harassing us once a week.

Sure, my pleasure.

If you would like to harass us, give us a call, 877-929-9673,

Or send your questions about words and language and everything else to us an email, words@waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, Martha. Hi, Grant. This is Peggy from Albuquerque.

Hi, Peggy.

Hi, Peggy. How are you doing?

Hi, I’m doing great, thanks.

What’s going on?

The other day I was listening to somebody on your show, and I don’t remember what exactly he was talking about,

But he was describing a scene at the dinner table and talking about certain conversations,

And he said, we didn’t want to open that particular.

And in my mind, I finished the phrase for him, can of worms.

But instead, he said, Pandora’s box.

And I thought, now, wait a minute.

So I’m calling to ask you guys, what is the difference between a can of worms and a Pandora’s box?

Are they different in your mind?

Well, they are in my mind.

How so?

I guess I think of, now, Martha, I know you’re a Greek and Latin scholar,

So you can probably tell the story way better than I can,

But there’s some story about a woman named Pandora who was given a box that she wasn’t supposed to open,

And she opened it anyway, and out came all kinds of bad things.

Yep, yep.

That’s pretty much it.

In the original story, it was a jar, and it had all these bad things in it that plagued mankind,

Bad, bad things. But the one thing that was left in the bottom of the jar after all these terrible

Things flew out, famine, pestilence, all this terrible stuff, the one thing that was left was

Hope or expectation down at the bottom of Pandora’s box or jar. Yeah, it’s kind of a beautiful story,

But it’s sort of an explanation for all the terrible things that happened to human beings.

You know, the Greeks were very fatalistic. And this was one story that told, it was sort of like

Original sin, you know, in biblical tradition. This is why all the bad stuff happens. So yeah,

A way of absolving humanity of its own guilt and responsibility.

Well, a way of explaining that bad things happen to good people and that kind of thing.

And then on the other hand, you have a can of worms. And so is that the same thing to you?

No. I realized as I was thinking about this, I realized in my mind,

Pandora’s box is unknown.

You don’t know what’s in there, but there’s a good likelihood that when you open it up, you’ll get a bad surprise.

A can of worms, you know what’s in there.

If a can of worms, you know it’s unpleasant.

Right.

You know, it’s like if you have a particular topic, you’re talking to your in-laws about religion, say, when you don’t agree.

You know that’s going to open a big old can of worms.

Right.

You know it’s going to be unpleasant.

You know you don’t really want to go there.

But it’s known.

At least in my mind, that’s a difference.

It’s a known unpleasantness versus an unknown, possibly unpleasant.

But I don’t know.

Yeah, Peggy, I think that you keyed in on exactly the thing that distinguishes them

Because Pandora was told, don’t open that, don’t open that, don’t open that.

And of course, her curiosity got the better of her.

And so she did.

But a can of worms, you’re right.

You know that there’s icky stuff in there.

It’s interesting that you said a particular can of worms.

I’m picturing a pantry with you.

Well, different kinds, right?

This is the politics one.

This is right.

This is the, he shouldn’t have married that woman one.

Marinara.

This is the, why don’t I have grad kids one?

Garlic and olive oil, clams.

And what about a barrel of monkeys?

Would you compare a barrel of monkeys to a can of worms in Pandora’s box?

Oh, boy.

Is that just fun?

That’s just a fun kind of chaos and disaster, right?

Right, yeah.

And what about a kettle of fish?

A barrel of monkeys is kindergartners with caffeine.

And a kettle of fish, I don’t know, I usually hear that and it’s a fine kettle of fish.

It sort of means an interesting state of affairs or something.

It doesn’t quite have the same danger connotation to me.

Right.

So I guess your question is, was that guy using Pandora’s box incorrectly then?

Yeah.

Yeah, he was saying that he didn’t want to go there because it was a difficult…

But he said that he didn’t want to open that particular Pandora’s box.

It sounds a little mixed metaphorical.

Yeah, how many Pandoras do you have?

How many boxes do Pandora have?

Well, and the whole can of worms thing, you know, I’m not even sure where that comes from.

You know, when I was a kid, we used to go fishing.

My dad would get worms, sometimes purchase them from the hardware store, usually in a little box.

And that’s how I picture a can of worms, just some kind of dirt and worms wiggling around in there.

But I don’t really know.

I think part of the can of worms is not knowing where one worm ends and another one begins.

Yeah, it’s all writhing.

And it’s kind of disgusting and creepy, and even though, yeah.

Yeah, just this gross mess of problems in there.

Well, this is a nice way to distinguish them.

In Pandora’s box, there are unknown problems.

Can of worms are pretty much known problems.

Okay.

All right.

Well, thank you.

This was a nice exploration of two terms, Peggy.

Thank you very much.

I appreciate your help, and thanks for your show.

It’s wonderful.

Bye-bye.

Thanks.

Bye.

Hey, you want to talk about words and how we use them?

Call us, 877-929-9673 is the number,

Or you can email us, words@waywordradio.org,

And find us on Facebook and Twitter.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Yeah, hi, my name is Ryan, and I’m calling from actually Venus, Texas,

Which is south of the Metroplex, yeah.

Okay, south of Dallas, Fort Worth.

Yeah, just south of Dallas, Fort Worth.

It’s actually, you know, everything’s becoming one big metroplex here.

Yeah.

What’s on your mind?

I had recently gotten to an argument with somebody and then a nice discussion with my librarian friend Amy about the possessive S at the end of my son’s name.

Because there seems to be no hard, fast rule other than you just kind of write it how it’s pronounced.

But, of course, you know, that led to some fun arguments in our family.

Because my son’s name is Atticus.

And so when I wrote his name on a box and I needed to put the apostrophe S at the end, I put the apostrophe S because that’s how it’s pronounced Atticus’s box.

And, of course, I got grief that, no, you just put the apostrophe at the end.

So that’s really where I was what I was calling about, getting the ruling on that.

I love that name, Atticus.

Yeah, thank you.

Yeah.

Do you use a certain style guide at work?

No.

Yeah, that’s another.

I’m working on my PhD, and when I was, I actually used the apostrophe S in an APA style paper,

And I got dinged on it because you’re not supposed to do it.

But I still made the argument, you know, that’s what got me into looking it up,

And I found, you know, some of the newspaper styles and stuff actually say it’s okay.

And really the only rule I could find consistently for something like a name is you’d write it how it sounds.

Like, for instance, Achilles heel is just Achilles with an apostrophe.

It’s not Achilles’ hill.

So that’s why with Atticus, I wrote the apostrophe S mainly just for clarity and for pronunciation because that’s all I could find.

This is a really interesting question.

Incredibly wonky, so of course we love it.

Pull up a chair.

Pull up a chair.

Here’s the thing.

We’ve already touched on this very important point when this kind of stuff comes up.

What style guide do you use is what controls this answer.

So if this were for the workplace, you mentioned the APA style guide, that’d be one.

You might use the Chicago Manual of Style or this AP style book or the ALA or just a ton of these different style guides, right?

And their rules are different.

They don’t agree on this stuff.

For example, there was something in a recent issue of the journal copy editing where this very question came up.

And so the editor there compared what the Chicago Manual of Style has to say versus the Associated Press Manual of Style.

And they differ on this.

Chicago says that if you have a singular proper noun ending in S, like Atticus, then you would use an apostrophe S.

However, the Associated Press Style Guide says you would just use an apostrophe.

See, I always go with consistency.

I agree.

That’s kind of my motto.

Yeah, well, that’s what style guides are about.

They’re supposed to apply consistency to all written documents in a particular environment.

You are fine to use apostrophe S or not, because unless you’ve pronounced a particular style guide, the style guide of your household.

There we go. I think I’m going to take your idea, and I’m going to deem an official style book of my household.

Therefore, while you’re in my house, you use my style book.

I’m sorry. I didn’t hear that request. That’s not according to style.

Ryan the enforcer.

Exactly. Well, thank you. That helps. That helps clear as mud.

Yeah.

Help clear as mud.

Yeah, just don’t eat it. Thanks, Ryan.

All right. Well, thank you very much.

Take care. Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

877-929-9673. words@waywordradio.org.

Grant, you know the term callow, right?

It means immature, lacking sophistication, callow youth.

Did you know that that goes all the way back to an old English word that means bald?

So how does it involve calliness?

I don’t understand.

Okay.

First of all, you have baldness.

And then it got applied to birds, like, you know, the little hatchlings that don’t have their feathers.

And then it got applied to the down on the birds.

And then the downy cheek of a boy who’s not quite growing his beard yet.

And then it was associated with youth.

Immaturity.

I see.

It’s a logical progression.

Yeah, Old English callu goes to callo, meaning immature.

So callo youth, callo elders, give us a call, 877-929-9673.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Adrienne calling from the North Country of New York.

Hi, Adrienne, welcome to the show.

Hi.

Where in North Country are you?

I’m in the Plattsburgh area.

Plattsburgh, cool.

What can we do for you?

Well, I’m calling about the word step, S-T-E-T.

I’ve run across it a couple of times in crossword puzzles now.

But other than the little bit of information that the clue gives, I don’t know much about it, so I’d love to get some more information.

What’s your understanding of the word?

Well, I believe it’s an editing term used to undo the deletion of a word when you’re doing a hand editing.

Yep, that’s exactly right.

Adrienne, as a writer, I love this word.

It’s a visceral, visceral reaction that I have.

You know, some people have reactions to the word moist.

Some people have reactions to the word pants or slacks.

I love the word stet because it means leave my writing the way it was.

That’s true.

I also think it’s interesting because with digital editing, it’s not needed anymore.

You just retype the word.

Yeah, that’s a good point, unless you’re looking at a hard copy, right?

But the word goes back to Latin.

It’s the third person subjunctive of the Latin word for to stand.

So it literally means let it stand.

Stats.

Yeah, it’s related to words like status.

You’re standing.

And the word stand, as a matter of fact.

Well, that’s really fascinating.

I’m glad that I could get a little bit more information about it.

I thought you were going to say I’m glad I could get a rise out of you, Martha,

Because I love this word.

You know, it’s the editor racking off.

I’m too close to a college campus.

I have to be coof.

Okay.

All right.

Well, stay coof.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Bye-bye.

I’m glad we got a chance to talk.

Sure.

Bye-bye.

Take care.

877-929-9673.

words@waywordradio.org.

We had a cute email from Timothy Riggs.

He lives in Bainbridge Island, Washington, and he’s five years old, Grant.

And he says,

My mom and I were playing tic-tac-toe, and we played a game where nobody won.

We call that a cat’s game.

But why?

My mom says you know a lot about words, so I decided to ask you.

So why do we call a draw in tic-tac-toe a cat’s game?

Do you know that term, Martha?

A cat’s game?

I never used it, no.

Yeah, we always just called it a draw.

Yeah.

Some people call it a tie or a scratch.

Yeah, but why a cat?

Did a cat make off like that?

We don’t really know, but what we do know is that throughout the history of this game,

Both in English and in Spanish, cats have been associated with it.

For example, the game is sometimes called Gato or Juego de Gato in the Spanish-speaking countries.

It has a lot of other names.

And it also has a lot of other names in English as well.

One of them, turns out, in the UK, it used to be called Kit Kat Canio.

Exactly the same game.

We’re talking about the game with two vertical lines, two horizontal lines,

Nine squares, X’s and O’s, try to get three in a row, right?

So it’s got the name cat in it.

Yeah.

Kit Kat Canio.

But it’s more than that.

Sometimes the tie game is also called the cat’s tail or just the cat.

And it turns out that sometimes some people who play this game, when there’s a draw or

A tie, they’ll say, that’s a cat’s game.

That’s one for the cat.

This goes to the cat.

The cat gets it.

I’m always imagining some little warm kitty cat sitting there watching the game.

Does cats do?

They’re just observing the scene from the highest perch that they can find.

But it’s really interesting that again and again, we find cats associated with this game.

So, Timothy, we don’t really know why they’re associated, but we do know that it goes far beyond just this one slang name for the tie.

Okay.

So, Timothy, it’s a really good question.

We’ll keep looking to this.

If we find out more about why a tie in tic-tac-toe is called the cat’s game, we’ll let you know.

If you have a question about language, email us, words@waywordradio.org, or call us, 877-929-9673.

Coming up, a curious connection between German philosophy and the language from Mars.

You’re listening to A Way with Words. I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette.

I’ve been so taken with the photos sent back to us by the Mars rover Curiosity.

Don’t you love them, Grant?

Mm—

Yeah, beautiful stuff.

Looks like Southern California.

It does.

It does.

And some of those images make you feel like you’re standing right there on the surface.

And the fact that it’s real, that it’s actually coming from another planet, I mean, it’s almost beyond comprehension.

And when I imagine walking around on Mars, I end up following my own curiosity, which, of course, as you know, involves language.

For one thing, if you’re walking around that planet, you’re going to see a lot of something called hematite.

And that’s a dark red mineral.

The word hematite derives from the Greek word heima, or blood.

And so hematite shares a root with hemoglobin and even anhemia, anemia, which literally means without blood.

On Mars, you’d also find a lot of a mineral called girtite.

Now, this is red, yellow, or brown.

And it’s the mineral that got NASA all excited when it was discovered on Mars in 2004,

Because Goethe can’t form without water.

So that discovery raised hopes of finding liquid water,

Or at least evidence that it existed there at one time.

And Goethe is spelled G-O-E-T-H-I-T-E.

And when I first saw that word, Grant, I thought,

Well, that looks like Goethe, the name of the German poet.

Is there a connection there?

And it turns out that there is, because by the time Goethe was 25,

He was already this big literary celebrity.

This would have been around 1774.

But he was also intensely interested in science and in particular geology.

And it turns out that he was so passionate about minerals that he collected more than 18,000 of them.

He had this massive mineral collection that was just legendary throughout Europe.

And so in 1806, mineralogists named that substance gertite in his honor.

And to me, there’s something about looking at those eerie pictures from the Martian terrain and knowing that it’s full of a mineral named for a poet.

And not just any poet, but the poet who once observed everything is simpler than one can imagine and yet complicated and intertwined beyond comprehension.

Beautiful.

877-929-9673 is the number to call.

Hi, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, Martha. This is Kelly Rose from Butte, Montana.

Hey, Kelly. Welcome.

Hi, Kelly. What’s up?

I’m a teacher, and I’ve taught for 21 years or more.

And just last year, I noticed my students were using a term that I know isn’t right, and the term is versing.

Versing. And they’re not talking about poetry, I take it.

I’m not talking poetry, no.

Kelly, what grade do you teach?

I teach fifth grade.

Oh, okay. So what do the kids mean when they talk about versing?

Well, it has to do with sporting events.

And, for instance, I might say we were versing the Huskies tonight in our girls’ volleyball game, or our football team versed Vikings last night.

Okay.

Are we going to verse them next week?

Yes.

Yes.

And so you’re just hearing this how recently?

Just in the last year.

You know, maybe I’d heard it before, but I really noticed it in the last year.

And I think I noticed some adults saying it, too.

I’m not surprised.

Actually, there should be quite a few adults using it.

The reason I know this is because we have written records of people using this going back 30 years.

And so those kids who were using it in the 80s are now grown up and using it, right?

So the kids are hearing it from their parents?

They could be hearing it from their parents, yeah.

And it’s explainable. It’s a really interesting word change, and it fits a pattern of word change in English that we know well.

So you probably already guessed that it’s a form of the word versus, V-E-R-S-U-S, right?

Right. That’s where I figured they were getting it from.

Right. So the tigers versus the jayhawks.

And versus, if you’re hearing it and not seeing it, sounds like a conjugated verb.

So you assume, because of your innate, instinctive understanding of the morphology of English, that there’s a verb to verse out there, which means to play against, right?

Right, right.

And so then you start using that way.

You say, I versed him and beat him in the game we were playing.

People use it in online games all the time.

All the time.

Most of the reports that we get about this use come from people who are playing video games or have heard it from their children who are playing video games.

And so once you’ve got this term that kind of is floating out there, it kind of is kids speaking to kids or it was kids speaking to kids.

And it becomes the slang of childhood.

It becomes a thing where there’s not even really necessarily an adult around to correct them or to nudge them gently in the right direction and say, oh, well, actually what you mean is and just kind of explain the Latin and that sort of thing.

And so here we are 30 plus years later.

This term is fairly widespread throughout the English speaking world.

We have plenty of reports of this in Australia and New Zealand and the United Kingdom and India and every place that young people have played against each other in sporting events or video games.

So is it wrong?

That’s always the question.

Let me ask you another question.

Okay.

What’s the singular of the word biceps?

Oh, I don’t know.

Well, the reason I ask is this is that pattern in English.

We have these words like versus and biceps and kudos and all of these other words, biscotti and panini, that are foreign.

They’re not exactly English, and we instinctively understand this, but we try to cram them into this misshapen space.

We make this foreign word that’s triangular try to fit in this octagonal English space, so to speak, right?

And so we kind of chip off some of the edges, and it doesn’t really fit, and it kind of does fit.

Biceps is plural and singular, traditionally.

Although we have in English decided that biceps sounds like a plural, so we’re going to say I have a really buff bicep on my left arm.

Yeah.

From all the weightlifting, right?

Yeah, two-headed muscle.

Yeah, there we go.

And kudos, most people say kudos.

We think that that must be a plural because it ends in an S.

But it’s not.

It’s a singular.

And so we say, I got a really nice kudo from her in a note yesterday.

Yeah, yeah.

And those of us who read Greek think, kudos.

So the question about whether or not you think versus is wrong probably depends on where in history you are.

Because when we see these changes happen in front of our eyes, they seem repugnant and repulsive.

Or at least a little dismaying.

I’m not bothered by it.

Or dismaying, maybe.

Yeah, I trip over it a little bit, but I think it’s absolutely coming in.

It’s done.

The change is on the way.

And once it’s done, Kelly, we’ll all think it’s ordinary.

It’s just while these transformations are underway that we find them the most appalling.

Should I not?

So if my students say it, it’s okay.

No.

What I would say is like, oh, I really love that slang word you have.

Let me show you what the Latin is like and explain to you what happened here.

I mean, it’s a learning opportunity rather than a correction opportunity.

Yeah, so they might use it on the playground, but not in a paper, in other words.

Let us know what happens, okay?

I will.

Thanks.

Thanks, Kelly.

It’s so nice to speak to you.

Thank you now.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

877-929-9673.

Grant, do you know the expression selling wolf tickets?

Selling wolf tickets?

Yeah.

Yes, I do.

It’s something to do with provoking a fight?

Sort of like threatening in a boastful manner.

And it’s a sample of African-American slang.

According to Geneva Smitherman, who’s done a lot of research on this kind of thing.

Wolf tickets goes back to the idea of a dog wolfing at night.

And if you’re selling wolf tickets, then you’re just making idle threats.

Or if you’re buying wolf tickets, then you’re taking the threat seriously.

You’re believing the boasts.

Yeah.

So W-O-O-F, not W-O-L-F.

I’ve seen it both ways.

But I think it’s originally wolf, like just, you know, a dog barking incessantly.

877-929-9673 is the number to call to talk about language.

Or send us an email, words@waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Jonathan from Bozeman, Montana.

Hi, Jonathan. Welcome to the show.

Hi, Jonathan. What’s on your mind?

My mother, 97 years old, she used to use the word doozy.

And I was wondering as to the origin of the word and exactly its meaning.

She would say, depending upon her tone, doozy was either good or bad.

So, for example?

You’d have a doozy of a problem or a doozy of a black eye?

Yeah, right.

Or something in a positive sense was doozy.

Oh, that’s a doozy.

Oh, I see.

So you went, let’s say, looking for the best Halloween pumpkin, and there was a great one, and it was a doozy.

That’s right.

That’s right.

Yeah, well, Jonathan, the best guess we have is that it probably comes from the word daisy.

Actually, as far back as the 1700s, the word daisy could apply to something that was really good, first rate, wonderful.

It wouldn’t have to be a flower.

No, no, it wouldn’t have to be a flower.

You know, it could be a pretty girl.

Ooh, that’s a daisy.

Or a fine horse.

Yeah, a fine horse, a great dog.

That’s the daisiest horse I’ve ever seen, that kind of thing.

Interesting.

And over time, it may have morphed into doozy.

There’s one other theory about this, which has to do with a great Italian actress named Eleonora Duse, who was very popular in the 1890s, and she made a tour of the U.S., and people just referred to her as Duse.

Most likely it comes from Duse.

So there’s some cross-pollination there between the two terms, right?

Very good, cross-pollination of Daisy, very good.

Yeah.

My mother’s about that old, so, yeah, it would probably still be around when she was young.

All right, thanks for your call, Jonathan.

All right. Thanks a lot.

Take care now.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

877-929-9673. words@waywordradio.org.

I have one more quotation from Goethe I’d like to share.

It goes,

One ought, every day at least, to hear a little song, read a good poem, see a fine picture.

And if it were possible, to speak a few reasonable words.

Nice.

That’s why I have the Mars rover bookmarked in my browser, so at least every day I can see a fine picture.

Send your favorite quotes to words@waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hello, my name is Mary, and I live in Fort Worth.

Hi, Mary, welcome.

It’s nice to be here.

I have two expressions that I need some help with.

And they’re really, it’s ancient history since I’m almost 87, and these words or expressions were heard when I was growing up.

My mother would say, for instance, when a dog asked out, and we’d put him outside, and we’d watch him run around and run around as dogs do, looking for the right spot.

Mother would say, look, he’s on a still hunt, S-T-I-L-L hunt.

I’ve never heard that expression.

And what did she mean by he’s on a still hunt?

Well, I don’t know.

He was just looking around to find the right place to go.

And so she would say, he’s on a still hunt.

And I thought that was just something Mother said.

It’s a widespread expression.

If you’ve ever done any hunting, you might know it.

It’s a kind of hunting where you don’t know where your prey is, and you don’t sit still.

You walk slowly and quietly looking from side to side to look for the deer or the rabbits or whatever it is that you’re hunting.

That’s a still hunt.

In politics, which is where I first encountered it, a still hunt is something a little different.

It’s kind of almost a surreptitious campaign where your opponents don’t quite realize what you’re up to until it’s too late.

There are a lot of different kinds of still hunts.

And so you sometimes find in the by-elections, say the years where there’s not a presidential election,

It used to be common where a party would figure out if they could get candidates on the ticket in all the regional and local elections

And get all their core supporters out without any advertising, they could take every office

Because people tend not to vote in elections where there are no presidents being decided.

And those are called still hunt campaigns or still hunt elections.

So the still in this has to do with not chasing so much?

Right. You are calmly, slowly, quietly walking.

Your dogs, if you bring hunting dogs, are not barking or baying.

You’re not beating the brush to chase the animals forward.

There’s no fox calls or anything like that, no trumpeting or anything like that.

But you’re also not standing still.

You’re not in a hide or a shelter or a deer stand.

You are moving when you’re looking for your prey.

That’s so interesting.

I have another one for you.

Would you like to try again?

Oh, yes, please.

This is what Mother would say when describing people

Whom she felt were simply not up to her standards.

She would say, they’re so ordinary.

And her tone let me know that she just didn’t approve of these people.

I’ve never heard anyone describe people that way.

That’s interesting because ordinary sounds like such a neutral term,

But she was using it in a negative way, correct?

Right.

It was very derogatory.

That sort of looked down their nose, you know?

Mm—

That meaning of ordinary to refer to somebody as crass or rude or vulgar or low class

Has been around since the 1600s, but it’s never been terribly common.

It does still exist in some varieties of American English, particularly in the South,

Where you use ordinary not to mean regular or common.

Well, you use it to mean common in the negative sense,

Which is like not of high class, not of good breeding, not of good taste.

It reminds me of Downton Abbey, you know.

You can just see Maggie Smith saying, they’re so ordinary.

And we’ve talked about this once on the show before, but I think it bears repeating, Mary.

Ordinary became the word ornery and kept some of that negative meaning.

And ornery is a corruption of ordinary.

Sometimes pronounced ornery.

That’s the way I pronounce it, which sounds even more like ordinary.

That’s another Southern expression.

I was built in Memphis, and so perhaps that has something to do with it.

So that’s so interesting.

You’ve helped me solve a mystery, and thank you so much.

It’s quite a pleasure, Mary.

Thank you for calling.

Bye-bye, Mary.

It was fun.

Take care now.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

877-929-9673 is the number to call.

We heard from Pamela Poon in Bozeman, Montana, who wanted to know about the phrase, a piece of work.

She says that she understands it to mean a pain in the rear.

For example, if you and your friends are discussing your local elected official, she writes,

Instead of openly criticizing her, you might say,

I saw Mary and we discussed the new zoning amendment, and well, all I can say is that she’s a real piece of work.

And so Pam wants to know if she’s using that correctly.

A real piece of work?

Yeah.

Yes, she is.

That’s a great definition for it.

In fact, Merriam-Webster has a definition I like a lot,

A complicated, difficult, or eccentric person.

So it’s somebody who is not quite normal for whatever reason

And probably disagrees with you.

We think, and I say we meaning the body of people who research language,

We think that it comes from Hamlet, from Shakespeare’s play Hamlet.

There is a scene in there where, if you remember,

Hamlet is kind of dissatisfied with life.

So Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are sent to him to kind of cheer him up.

And he’s explaining to them, despite the fact that humans are these amazing things,

And he says, what a piece of work is a man.

How noble in reason, how infinite in faculty.

Even though he thinks all these great things, he still can’t take delight in them.

And so he’s kind of using it literally to mean we are a great piece of work.

But it is believed that that piece of work is then borrowed by people who are literate and well-read and that sort of thing

Is a kind of an allusion to this, even though you are an amazing living human being and you’re an awesome creature,

You’re still disappointing me in some way.

That’s great. I didn’t realize there was a connection.

That’s the best guess that we have. It’s a great one.

But by the 1920s, it was well entrenched in slang.

You can ask your questions about language by emailing us as well, words@waywordradio.org,

Or find us on Facebook and Twitter.

Things have come to a pretty past.

That’s all for this week’s broadcast.

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A Way with Words is independently produced and distributed by Wayword, Inc.,

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Better human communication, and the value of a thing well said or well written.

The show is recorded at Studio West in San Diego, California.

Thanks for listening. I’m Martha Barnette.

And I’m Grant Barrett. Take care.

Ciao.

Neither, neither. Let’s call the whole thing off.

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You like tomato and I like tomato.

Potato, potato, tomato, tomato.

Let’s call the whole thing off.

But oh, if we call the whole thing off, then we must…

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