A listener from Tennessee has a saying that doesn’t quite land with his friends: “Is it any count?” Martha confirms that the phrase is most definitely Southern. It originates in the word “account,” and the question of...
Greg Pliska, musical director for the Broadway show War Horse and our very own Quiz Guy, has a puzzle about Animal Hybrid Phrases combining two common expressions involving animals. For example, what do you get when stuffed animal stocks go down? A...
A listener has spent the last 30 years looking for the origin of the playful phrase “you’re the berries.” This affectionate expression first appears in literature in the 1908 book Sorrows of a Showgirl, then made its way into...
Where do we get the phrase “belly up”? The expression has made its way to the bar, but the original belly up belonged to a dead fish. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Belly Up” Hello, you have A Way with...
What’s the source of the phrase “No way, Jose”? And who in the world is Jose? Although in this call Grant says the expression doesn’t show up in print until 1973, he has since found it in a college newspaper in 1966 and no doubt it is probably older...
A Wyoming native asks about the origin of her father’s term of approbation, good leather. Grant thinks it might be from baseball, where good leather means “good fielding with a leather ball in a leather glove.” This is part of a...