A U.S. Forest Service firefighter in Lakeland, Florida, also teaches classes on chainsaw safety, and wants to make sure he’s using gender-neutral pronouns when doing so. The epicene pronoun they will work just fine. This is part of a complete...
min pin n.— «A group that saves miniature pinchers, which are affectionately called “min pins,” says it’s getting calls for help from all over the state.» —“From a home to a cage” by Ken Suarez in Lakeland MyFox Tampa Bay (Florida) Dec. 3, 2008...
sand spur n.— «In personality profiles newspapers use what some refer to as “sand spurs,” referring to little foibles of the person that show him or her as real, rather than just the subject of PR flackery. In Troutman’s case, instead of a “sand...
bonus baby n.— «Al, who signed with the Tigers in 1953, was what was then known in baseball as a “bonus baby.” As a result, he came straight to the big leagues out of high school when he was 18.» —“Big day for Kalines” by Jim Hawkins in Lakeland...
soft hands n.pl.— «Cabrera will not say how much weight he has lost since last season, but scouts have agreed a third baseman with “soft hands”—baseball parlance for being able to neatly catch the ball—and a strong arm would likely pare his errors...
cybridization n.— «An experimental method called cybridization transfers a gene for sterility into seedy varieties, rendering them seedless more efficiently than the shotgun approach used in irradiation.» —“Seedless Fruits Make Others Needless” by...