pipe
v.— «He writes in the style of the metro column, a genre that has included some of the best newspaper writing ever, but also its share of “piping,” making stuff up in the tradition of Damon Runyon, who wrote fiction. (One columnist calls such fabrications “Danny Boys,” as in “Danny Boy, the pipes are calling.”)» —“What Was He Thinking? Another Boston columnist runs into trouble” by Claudia Kalb, Richard Turner Newsweek Aug. 17, 1998. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
How do you transform ancient Chinese script for use in the modern age? English uses a keyboard with just 26 letters, but the first Chinese typewriter looked like a small table under a huge disk with more than 4,000 characters. A new book chronicles...
What’s up with ketchup? The shifting history and spelling of the name of this condiment. For centuries, ketchup was a fishy sauce originating in Asia—the tomatoes came only later! Plus, a new book shows what’s lost when a language dies: when there...