In the 19th century, the slang term door-knocker referred to a beard-and-mustache combo that ringed the mouth in the shape of a metal ring used to tap on a door. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Door-Knocker Beard”...
Try this tricky puzzle: Take the words new door and rearrange their letters into one word. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “New Door Word Puzzle” You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and...
Why doesn’t an usher ush? The word goes all the way back to Latin os, meaning “mouth,” and its derivative ostium, meaning “door.” An usher was originally a servant in charge of letting people in and out of a door. This...
A Dutch door is split horizontally so the bottom half can stay latched while the top half swings open. It’s also called a stable door or half-door, and the barn association helps explain the informal name Mr. Ed door. That nickname points to the...
Dead as a doornail is a common idiom, but what exactly is a doornail, and why is it dead? The saying goes at least as far back as the 1350’s, and may simply refer to the fact that the nails used to make big, heavy doors were securely fixed in...
Sure, it’s scary to send your writing to a literary agent. But pity the poor agent who must wade through hundreds of terrible query letters a week! One of them shares excerpts from those hilariously bad query letters on a blog called SlushPile...