To describe something tiny or insignificant compared with something vast, you might reach for phrases like a drop in the ocean or a drop in the bucket. In Mandarin, there’s an equally picturesque phrase that translates as nine cows, one hair, 九 牛 一...
In Appalachia, if you ignore better choices before choosing a lesser one, such as a mate, you might be said to fly all over a daisy field and settle on a cow pile or flit like a butterfly from flower to flower and land on a cow crap. This is part of...
Louis in Reno, Nevada, grew up in Montreal, Canada, speaking Québécois French. His father was fond of saying j’aime vacher le matin, puis je prends mon temps, meaning “I like to loaf and take my time in the morning.” Vacher comes from French vache...
Secret signals on the job: Waitresses at some 19th-century restaurants ensured speedy drink service by communicating with a non-verbal code. One server took orders, then placed each customer’s cup to indicate exactly what the customer wanted. A...
The Italian idiom far venire il latte alle ginocchia literally means “to make milk come to the knees.” Figuratively, it means “to be really boring.” It’s been suggested that the phrase refers to the tedious process of sitting and milking a cow, as...
In response to our conversation about how to handle swearing in high-school classrooms, a longtime teacher shares a strategy that works for her. She insists that anytime students want to swear in her presence, they should instead say the words moo...
