The French phrase au jus means with sauce, which is why it drives some diners to distraction when a menu lists beef with “au jus sauce.” A Wisconsin listener calls to say this phrase sets her teeth on edge. The hosts order up an answer...
What do you call a word made from a blend of two other words, like motel from motor and hotel? A listener says his term for them is “Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup words,” after the old commercial: “You got chocolate in my peanut...
Is that oh-so-handy sticky stuff called duct tape or duck tape? An Emmy-nominated filmmaker is wondering, specifically because he has to instruct narrators to be careful to avoid running together a “T” sound at the end of a word with the...
Welcome to another newsletter from A Way with Words. This one's full of soda-fountain goodness! Let's just say right out of the gate that, judging by the emails and phone calls, the top call for this past weekend's show was the one...
In this episode, Martha and Grant honor winners of the Ig Nobel Prizes, those wacky awards for weird academic research, and they help a caller decipher a puzzling word from a personals ad: what does paratereseomaniac mean?
Welcome to another issue of the A Way with Words newsletter! If you weren't listening to the radio this weekend, you now have another chance to hear a discussion of the pronunciation of "eco" in eco-friendly, last-ditch vs...