Responding to someone during a dispute with What does that have to do with the price of tea in China? is a way to deflect the comment or derail the discussion entirely. While the phrase the price of tea in China is the most common version...
The term skycap for workers who help with luggage at an airport was coined by analogy with redcap, a term for porters on trains who wore red caps. Skycap was the winning entry in a contest. Another contest, held in 1923, gave us the word scofflaw, a...
Why is an insulated sleeve for a beverage called a koozie, often spelled koozy, coozy, coozie, and other ways? Any relation to a tea cozy used to keep a teapot warm? In Australia, a coozie is often called a stubby holder, a stubby or stubbie being...
nimbleton n.— «So let’s raise a glass to big funds with a toast of sincere best wishes for their success . . . of course, I’ll be explicit about my ulterior motive: keeping the small fund space the preserve of the nimbletons. If big...
slug pub n.— «A dish of beer, which Conrad and Petterson like to call the “slug pub,” does away with the slimy critters. “The slugs are attracted to the beer, and they die happy.”» —“Gardeners keepin’ it...
o-beer-time n.— Note: Seems to be similar to “beer o’clock” and “beer thirty,” which also mean “an instance of, or an occasion suitable for, drinking.” «It was already understood that the crowd in...