The phrases “Well, I swan!” and “Well, I swannee!” are genteel substitutes for swearing. Where do those phrases come from? This is part of a complete episode.
“Redd up the table!” A California listener says he remembers hearing that all the time when growing up in Iowa, but now that he’s on the West Coast, no one has any idea what he’s talking about. This is part of a complete...
A Pittsburgh woman reports that when she went away to college, she was surprised to find people correcting her grammar when she’d say things like “the car needs washed” or “the kids need picked up.” She wonders if...
The word decimate has a grisly etymology. It derives from a Latin military term meaning “to execute every tenth man in an army unit”— the penalty for a failed mutiny. As a result, some sticklers insist that the English word decimate...
It’s a grammatical question that trips up even the best writers sometimes: Is it who or whom? A physician says he likes the sentiment in a colleague’s email signature, but he’s not sure it’s 100% grammatical. The sentence:...
Why do some people pronounce the word wash as “warsh”? Martha and Grant discuss the so-called “intrusive R” and why it makes people say “warsh” instead of “wash” and “Warshington” instead...