Jennifer, an elementary-school teacher in Tallahassee, Florida, loves saying the term chockablock, meaning “closely packed together,” and wonders about its etymology. Chock can refer to a kind of wedge used to hold something in place, and chockablock is the point in a block-and-tackle pulley system where the wooden blocks that contain pulleys on a rope are pulled in contact with each other, so that they can move no farther. Sailors also call this situation two-block or block-and-block, but by the 19th century, the term chockablock had come ashore and taken on the meaning of “very full.” For a good illustration of this condition, check out The Overlook Illustrated Dictionary of Nautical Terms by Graham Blackburn. This is part of a complete episode.
When you’re talking about the location of an inanimate object, is it okay to say that it lives there, as in The peanut butter lives in that cabinet or The flashlight lives on that shelf? Strictly speaking, of course, that object isn’t...
Sean in Oneonta, New York, says that when he was growing up in New Jersey, his family would pile in the car and set off on a surprise adventure, whether a short distance or long, and the kids would be told only that they were going on Buxtehude...
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