Ashley from Berea, Kentucky, wonders about her father’s use of nords, apparently to mean “in other words.” This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Nords in Other Words” Hey there, you have A Way with Words...
The phrase old as Methuselah describes someone quite advanced in years. In ancient scripture, Methuselah was a man who somehow lived to the ripe old age of 969. Plus, a heartwarming book for children tells the story of how a Puerto Rican family...
Contractions have been used in English since Elizabethan times, but conventions about their correct use go in and out of favor. Writing in 1899 in the monthly magazine Correct English, author and publisher Josephine Turck Baker advised that using...
Cat hair may be something you brush off, but cat hair is also a slang term that means “money.” In the same way, cat beer isn’t alcoholic — some people use cat beer as a joking term for “milk.” And imagine walking on a...
A pickle inspired this week’s puzzle from Quiz Guy John Chaneski. He was thinking about the fact that if you need something to help you strum a guitar, a “pickle do just fine,” the word pickle sounding, of course, like an...
Jason from De Pere, Wisconsin, was surprised to see that among the spelling words his twin second-graders were studying was the contraction this’ll. Is a term like this’ll really appropriate for a second-grade spelling test? This is part...