When Julie and her sister were growing up in England and their grandmother saw them giggling over something, her grandmother would say You girls would laugh to see a pudding crawl! The phrase suggested that they’d laugh at anything. It evolved...
Mike in Jacksonville, Florida, is curious about the phrase There’s no use in keeping the dogs and doing the barking yourself. His dad would use it when delegating a chore to one of his kids. As early as the 1500s, the proverb Don’t keep...
Quiz Guy John Chaneski’s puzzle is about animal anatomy, specifically nouns and adjectives formed by combining the name of an animal with another word. For example, what zoologically-related noun is associated with the idea of “a high...
Chris in Northampton, Massachusetts, and his mother are debating whether you can refer to your dog as somebody? Is it reasonable to say your pet is a someone rather than a something? Strictly speaking, dictionaries define the word someone as...
Jessica in Indianapolis, Indiana, says her field of software development, rubber duck applies to a situation where you describe a problem you’re struggling with to someone else, and in the process of explaining it, you hit upon the solution...
Quiz Guy John Chaneski unleashes some quizzical canine conundrums. For example, if you playfully tap a dog on the nose, you boop him. Change one letter and you have the doggolingo term for what happens when dogs stick out their tongues but then...