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Funny cat videos and cute online photos inspire equally adorable slang terms we use to talk about them. • Also, when a salamander is not a salamander, the story of an Italian term for a dish towel used halfway across the world, Bozo buttons...
How often do you hear the words campaign and political in the same breath? Oddly enough, 19th-century grammarians railed against using campaign to mean “an electoral contest.” Martha and Grant discuss why. And, lost in translation: a...
Our conversation about gram weenies, those ultralight backpackers who go to extremes to shave off every last bit of excess weight in their gear, prompts a bicyclist in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to share some cycling slang about ways to find a...
The words plethora and drastic both have roots in ancient Greek. Both were first used in English as medical terms, plethora indicating “an excess of bodily fluid” and drastic meaning “having an effect.” This is part of a...
iceberg disease n.— «Experts commonly refer to it as an “iceberg” disease. Visible at the tip are individuals whose symptoms include diarrhea, abdominal pain, weight loss and, in children, delayed growth. The rest of the...
logbook lending n.— «Increasing numbers of borrowers with bad credit records are resorting to taking out loans with exorbitantly high interest against the value of their cars, according to debt counselling charities. The practice, known...