Betty in Idlewild, California, notices that when she repeats a word while writing, even an ordinary one like among, it can start to look misspelled or meaningless. That temporary blanking-out is called semantic satiation, the mind’s sense that a...
Quiz Guy John Chaneski has a word puzzle called “Novel Novels,” in which he gives clues to the names of novels similar to familiar ones, except for one letter. Try this one: “This offbeat novel is based on an incident concerning a nudist club and an...
In our recent episode, Dust Bunnies and Ghost Turds, Grant mentioned simping, a slang term for “the act of pursuing a woman online in a fawning fashion.” What’s the etymological source of simping? “Cyberpimping”? “Acting like a simpleton”...