Why do we write the sound of a dog barking as bow wow? Isn’t that noise more like woof, woof or arf, arf or ruff ruff? Surprisingly, the oldest of these is bow wow, or as William Shakespeare wrote in The Tempest (Bookshop|Amazon), bowgh wawgh...
The slang term 4-55 air conditioning is means cooling a car by driving fast with all the windows down. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Air Conditioning With a Do-It-Yourself Crank: 4-55” A friend in Phoenix just taught...
Cory in Newark, Ohio, says that while in South Africa, he heard the exclamation shot! used in an empathetic way to mean “that’s so sweet!” or “bless your heart!” In South Africa, the word can be used to express agreement, and in Australia, the...
Britain’s new polar research ship is named RSS Sir David Attenborough, even though an online vote overwhelmingly chose the name Boaty McBoatface. Versions of this playful construction go back at least as far as a 1987 episode of the television...