In 1971, when a new public library opened in Troy, Michigan, famous authors and artists were invited to write letters to the city’s youngest readers, extolling the many benefits of libraries. One of the loveliest was from E.B. White, author of...
Doug in Madison, Wisconsin, remembers that when he was growing up in Philadelphia, his dad used the phrase the big mahoff to refer to someone important. This term that means “the big boss” or “the big cheese,” is largely...
Are we a nosy species? A listener married to a woman from Bangladesh explains how a Bengali term that translates as “nose-going” reflects the naturally inquisitive style of Bangladeshi culture. In many languages, the nose figures...
reverse inquiry n.— «Market participants echoed those comments. “The book was incredibly large and the average fill was only 20% to 25%,” meaning that institutional investors received one-fifth to one-quarter of the orders...
block busting n.— «A committee of civic politicians wants to know what the city and cops are doing to crack down on “unscrupulous property owners.” It comes following an inquiry made by Coun. Don Iveson, who was concerned...
job and knock n.— «A regular inquiry theme has been the RailCorp tradition of “job and knock”—a term for leaving a job after only a couple of hours but charging for the whole day.» —“Employee goes back to work despite...