Susannah in Aiken, South Carolina, is curious about slumgullion, a word her dad used to denote “gooey baby food” or “goopy oatmeal.” Slumgullion originated with the California gold rush, when miners forced large quantities of water through soil to flush away lighter components and leave heavier ones, including gold nuggets. The discarded, sludgy wastewater was called slumgullion, probably from slum, similar to slime, and gullion, either “a muddy cesspool” or “a type of stomachache.” Slumgullion may also be related to slobgollion, a term Herman Melville used in Moby-Dick (Bookshop|Amazon) to mean “the discarded offal of a whale.” This is part of a complete episode.
What makes a great first line of a book? How do the best authors put together an initial sentence that draws you in and makes you want to read more? We’re talking about the openings of such novels as George Orwell’s 1984...
To slip someone a mickey means to doctor a drink and give it to an unwitting recipient. The phrase goes back to Mickey Finn of the Lone Star Saloon in Chicago, who in the late 19th century was notorious for drugging certain customers and relieving...
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