Ben in Richmond, Virginia, is puzzled by the expression Believe you me. It sounds odd because it mixes up the usual subject-verb-object order in English. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Believe You Me” Hello, you have...
Why are those tiny, white flowers that grace bouquets called baby’s breath? Some people say they like newborn’s breath, but the name may simply reflect the fact that these blossoms are small and delicate. Their genus name, Gypsophila...
Byron from Norfolk, Virginia, ran across goldbrick in a 1950s military police training film, where it meant someone useless or unreliable. The slang goes back to a 19th-century swindle in which scammers painted lead or other metals gold and sold...
Betsy in Virginia Beach, Virginia, asks about her family’s word goonus, fondly used for loose, soft flesh on people or animals, from baby thigh rolls to the flap that swings under a cat’s belly. It does not appear in the literature consulted, and it...
Jill in Indianapolis, Indiana, wonders how to spell the one-syllable cheer that starts with Y. Is it yay or yea? Since the 1930s, yay has been used as a little celebratory word. The word yea is much older and used in formal texts to mean...
Andrea in San Diego, California, noticed a new restaurant with a name spelled in a curious way. Is there a term for this kind of intentional misspelling used in advertising? Onomastics is the study of naming, and a good source for information about...