When a listener from Buffalo, New York, was a child, she was told to stop being so rutschy, or in other words, to stop being so “fidgety.” Rutsch, meaning “to squirm,” and its variants, which include rooch and roosh, come...
“What has a head like a cat, feet like a cat, a tail like a cat, but isn’t a cat?” Answer: a kitten! A 1948 children’s joke book has lots of these to share with kids. Plus: an easy explanation for the difference between...
The phrase don’t worry, it’ll be a pig’s foot in the morning is meant to comfort or reassure a child who’s stubbed her toe or scraped her knee or suffered some other minor injury. This expression is especially common in...
When you had sleepovers as a child, what did you call the makeshift beds you made on the floor? In some places, you call those bedclothes and blankets a pallet. This word comes from an old term for “straw.” And: What’s the story...
Book recommendations, including a collection of short stories inspired by dictionaries, and a techno-thriller for teens. Or, how about novels with an upbeat message? Publishers call this genre up lit. Plus, a clergyman ponders an arresting phrase in...
jacket n.—Gloss: Richard Allsopp’s Dictionary of Caribbean English Usage defines this as “the child of a married woman and a man who is not her hustband” or “any child whose paternity is denied.” Note: The term is...