Does language acquisition correspond with being ambidextrous? A woman notices her polyglot husband takes notes with his right hand for certain languages, then switches to his left for other ones. And: What’s the difference between an orchard and a...
Liam from San Francisco, California, asks about woo-woo, an adjective for beliefs or practices that strike someone as kooky, mystical, unscientific, or just a little out there. The modern use shows up by the 1980s and 1990s, and an early-1970s...
Jeffrey in New Bern, North Carolina, wonders why we use the phrase right as rain to mean “all satisfactory” or “quite correct.” No one’s sure about the origin of this expression, although it may reflect positive associations with precipitation on...
Tenley in Jackson, Wyoming, calls to share the bro-brah slang of fellow skiers there. If a skier or snowboarder is taking on a challenging run, others will cheer them on with Bro, send it! or Sick! You sent that!, and they use the adjective sendy...
Do you pour over a document or pore over a document? Although it’s tempting to assume that the phrase alludes to pouring one’s attention all over something (as if your vision was a substance), the correct word is pore, a term that since the 13th...
Lucy, a middle-school student in San Diego, California, is puzzled by a phrase her mother uses when something is not quite up to snuff or falls short of the mark: close, but no tomato. It appears to be a variant of close, but no cigar, a phrase...