smog
v.— «Arthur Garcia had been driving the same small, 22-year-old truck to work and back for the last 12 years. But when it came time in May to get his pickup “smogged,” Californian slang for an emissions test, his local garage told him that the vehicle would not pass, not even with a tune-up.» —“There is gold in that smogmobile” CNN.com July 11, 2000. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
In the 15th century, the word respair meant “to have hope again.” Although this word fell out of use, it’s among dozens collected in a new book of soothing vocabulary for troubled times. Plus, baseball slang: If a batter...
Asthenosphere, a geologist’s term for the molten layer beneath the earth’s crust, sparks a journey that stretches all the way from ancient Greece to the author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Plus: What the heck is a dogberg? It’s when...