Bubbler, meaning water fountain, is strongly associated with eastern Wisconsin and Rhode Island, where John from Minneapolis grew up saying it as bubbla. One early trail leads to the Kohler Company in Wisconsin, which introduced a bubbling valve...
A woman who grew up in Detroit remembers her mother saying, “This one’s going to be a real blinger!” whenever a big storm was coming. What exactly is a blinger? This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “A Real...
Ahoy, mateys! You've received another newsletter from "A Way with Words," which, like a walk around the promenade deck, is known to relieve uncomfortable internal distress. What do children call their grandparents? What is a...
Bruce in Indianapolis heard older Indiana farm folks use work-brickle for someone who’s industrious, or, in the negative, not much of a worker. The expression goes back to dialects of the British Isles and survives in U.S. pockets with shifting...
Tom in Dodgeville, Wisconsin, asks about catawampus, cattywampus, or kittywampus, words used for something crooked, askew, or out of line. The Dictionary of American Regional English records related senses including “diagonally across,” “utterly or...
In certain parts of the South, a small, impromptu gift is variously known by the sibilant synonyms sirsee, surcy, searcy, or circe. A South Carolina woman who’s heard the word all her life is baffled as to where it came from. This is part of a...