curbstoning

curbstoning
 n.— «There are follow-up visits to housing units where residents did not send in forms or mailed back incomplete ones and field inspections of addresses declared vacant or listed as having only one occupant, a danger signal that a “curbstoning” census worker may not have taken the trouble to look inside.» —“Can Heads Be Counted in a Dynamic City?” by Richard Levine New York Times Sept. 22, 1990. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)

Leave a comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Further reading

That Burns My Onions!

A listener in Unadilla, New York, says her husband, whose family is French-Canadian, uses the phrase That burns my onions when something irritates him. There are several kitchen-related metaphors used to express anger, including that steams my...

Sliding Ponds and Paths

In New York and northern New Jersey, a children’s playground slide was once commonly known as sliding pond or sliding pon. The terms reflect the considerable influence of Dutch settlement in that area, the Dutch word baan meaning a “path” and...