Will in Austin, Texas, feels a little odd every time he uses the expression funnily enough. Although the phrase is grammatically correct, it still feels awkward to say. In part, that’s because the adjective funny ends in the letter Y, but...
A young woman from Portland, Oregon, seeks a noun to denote something fake or otherwise dubious. She doesn’t want an obvious swear word, but also doesn’t like the ones she found in the thesaurus. She thinks malarkey, poppycock, and flim-flam sound...
So, um, where do those, er, filler words come from? Discourse particles, as they’re also known, are used to fill those gaps when we’re thinking of what to say but don’t want to lose our turn in a conversation. English isn’t the only language that...
Um, are you, like, one of those people who, get, like, really annoyed, by, you know, like, lots of filler words in, you know, like, conversation? If it’s any comfort, there’s a great term for this. Can you say embololalia?
schluff v.—Gloss: To temporarily dismount a bicycle and use it something like a scooter in a place where bicycle-riding is forbidden or unwelcome. «Sidewalk bike riding is like jaywalking—who among us cannot resist, once in a while or more. Bikes...
ideologically inbred adj.— «College towns have cosmopolitan amenities (lectures, music, ethnic restaurants, libraries) but also an almost surreal degree of cultural cohesion—“ideologically inbred” communities where residents read, watch and vote...