Spendy

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Joseph, downtown San Diego.

Well, Joseph, welcome to the program. How can we help you?

Well, I was up in, took a trip up to southern Oregon.

I went up to, actually up to Crater Lake in that area.

And we went to this little town that was the closest to where we were staying.

And it was like, you know, one road in, one road out, and I needed gas.

So I asked the attendant, I says, you know, where’s your favorite place to eat?

And he said, and there were like three restaurants.

And he said, well, I like the pizza place.

He said, but there’s another place.

It’s a local hangout.

And he says, there’s another restaurant that’s in the hotel.

He said, but that’s kind of spendy.

And I didn’t know if it was a malaprop or if he mentioned, say, expensive or pricey, but it came out spendy.

And I said, I like that word.

So I’ve included it now in my vocabulary whenever the occasion arises.

Nice.

So he meant that it was expensive.

Yes, yes.

Joseph, I’m jealous because I have never heard that term in the wild.

But you know about it from books.

I know about it from books.

Sort of the story of my life.

When a man has certain feelings for a woman, Martha.

I read about that.

So, Spinny, so this was new to you, Joseph.

You were in Oregon, and the person you were talking to was from Oregon?

Yeah, yeah.

He was the, I guess he owned or was the manager at the local gas station.

And there was only one station there, and I needed to, because we were in the middle of nowhere up there.

So, Grant, you’re familiar with this term.

But kind of like you from books, but also it seems that when I meet people from Portland

And we begin to talk about this show and my dictionary work and so forth,

This is a word they bring up because they know that it’s special.

This word, Joseph, is particularly common to the Northwest,

Washington and Oregon and up in that area.

Although it’s been reported across the country for more than 100 years,

It just somehow is associated with that part of this continent.

Oh, okay.

I lived up in Portland in the mid-70s.

Oh, you did?

I never remember hearing it up at that time.

So Idaho and Oregon and Washington State and maybe even as far north as Alaska and, of course, western Canada, you’re more likely to hear Spendy.

Yeah, and the word’s been around for 100 years or so.

Originally, it meant extravagant, like that person is Spendy.

He’s spending money all over the place.

But then over time, it came to mean specifically something that’s really expensive or dear, as they would say in England.

I think this is one of those words that has the potential to be used commonly and frequently by everyone because it makes perfect sense.

Especially now.

Yeah.

Yeah.

The level of spendy has changed a little bit.

The spendy line is going way down.

The spendy line.

I love that.

If the government reported today, the spendy line was about two points.

I like that.

That’s funny.

Joseph, thanks for calling and sharing your story.

Thank you.

Bye-bye.

Have you traveled to a different part of the country and heard a word that just doesn’t make sense?

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