What’s the difference between a grove and an orchard? Every orchard is a grove, but not every grove is an orchard. Can you speak of an apple grove or an orange orchard? Yes, although it’s far more common to say apple orchard and orange grove. The...
A listener reports that in and around his hometown of Le Mars, Iowa, the kind of loose-meat sandwich that others might call a sloppy joe is known as a tavern or a tavern sandwich, a name that likely goes back to a restaurant in nearby Sioux City...
One means of hazing newbies in the Army: send them to get a hundred feet of chow line. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “A Hundred Feet of Chow Line” We had a message from Ernest Pemberton who wanted to tell us about hazing newbies...
Dale from Huntsville, Alabama, recalls a colleague in Québec dissing imitation maple syrup as lamppost syrup. Indeed, the phrase sirop de poteau, or “pole syrup,” is a disdainful reference used by French-speaking Canadians referring to the weak...
In Spanish, someone who’s conceited may be described as considering themselves la ultima Coca-Cola del desierto or “the last Coca-Cola in the desert.” Similar Spanish phrases are rendered in English as “the last beer in the stadium” or “the last...
How do you pronounce rooibos? The name of this tea comes from the Afrikaans words rooi bos, meaning “red bush.” Rooibos is pronounced ROY-boss, but it’s also called bush tea, red tea, or redbush tea. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of...