Adam in Indianapolis grew up with his grandmother’s warning not to split a pole, meaning that two companions shouldn’t pass on opposite sides of a lamppost, mailbox, or other street obstacle. The idea is that the physical separation hints at an...
“If I agreed with you, we’d both be wrong.” Listeners share some of their favorite paraprosdokians. It’s not the first time Martha and Grant discussed paraprosdokians. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of...
A caller named Todd says that when people meet him for the first time, they sometimes call him Scott, even if he’s wearing a nametag with his real name on it. It’s happened too many times to be a coincidence, he says, and wonders if...
Stories From The Onion In this week’s episode, Martha and Grant discuss not-to-be-believed articles about language from the satirical newspaper The Onion, including one headlined “Underfunded Schools Forced to Cut Past Tense from...
What do you call that jarring sensation when you see a radio personality for the first time, and he looks nothing like what you expected? The hosts talked about it in a past episode. Listeners responded with more words for this phenomenon. This is...
Time to solve another linguistic mystery. You’re in a restaurant. You overhear a conversation at the next table. The woman says to her friend, “You know, I just love the taste of joe floggers.” And her dining companion replies...