On Twitter @flaminghaystack asks: What if the person who named walkie talkies named everything? For starters, we might refer to a defibrillator as a hearty starty and stamps as licky stickies. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “New Rhyming Names for Everything”
You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it. I’m Grant Barrett.
And I’m Martha Barnette.
On Twitter, Antonia Nickel, who tweets at Flamin’ Haystack, asked, what if the person who named walkie-talkies named everything?
Oh boy.
So stamps, therefore, would be… lickies-stickies?
Yeah! What about a defibrillator?
Shocky hockey? I don’t know.
How about hearty-starty?
Hearty-starty, nice.
And what about a pregnancy test?
Oh, oh, no.
Preg twig?
I don’t know.
The pee stick?
I don’t know.
Ify jiffy?
No, it’s maybe baby.
Maybe baby!
And what’s her name again?
Her name is Antonia Nichol.
Supposedly, she’s a firefighter in London.
Antonia, you’re making the world better one word at a time.
That’s right.
Oh, and speaking of words, what about parrots?
Parrots, beaky, speaky?
Speaky beaky?
That’s better than what I saw.
Yeah, wordy birdies.
Wordy birdies.
Nice.
Very good.
If you’ve got some of these rhyming compounds for everyday things, let us know, 877-929-9673.
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