The expression If you don’t chance your arm, you won’t break your neck makes use of the sense of break your neck meaning “to go all out.” The break your neck part may refer to having success from giving all your effort...
A stereotype is a preconceived notion about a person or group. Originally, though, the word stereotype referred to a printing device used to produce lots of identical copies. • The link between tiny mythical creatures called trolls and modern-day...
Sometimes it’s a challenge to give a book a chance: How many pages should you read before deciding it’s not worth your time? There’s a new formula to help with that decision — and it’s all based on your age. • Have you ever...
Why is a V-shaped hairline called a widow’s peak? This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Widow’s Peak” Hello, you have A Way with Words. Yes. Hi, this is Sue Carnam, and I’m calling from Kilmarnock, Virginia...
Our conversation about bang out sick and bang in sick, both meaning to “call one’s employer to say they’re not coming in to work,” prompted a response from historian Judith Flanders, who notes that in the UK, there’s a...
Jacob in Frankfort, Kentucky, remembers that on foggy mornings in Appalachia, he’d hear grownups say that the groundhogs are making coffee. Writer Jesse Stuart, who served as Kentucky’s Poet Laureate in the mid-1950s, wrote evocatively...