Barbara Kingsolver’s book Demon Copperhead is a retelling of Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield set in today’s Appalachia. Martha shares memories of a long-ago visit to Kingsolver’s family farm in Virginia, where they...
In the late 19th century, the name willipus-wallipus denoted a legendary monster said to haunt the American South. The term also came to designate “a steamroller” or “any large piece of road equipment.” The term lapslock...
Flight crews have a word for colleagues who check into a hotel, slam the door behind them, lock it shut, and don’t re-emerge until checkout time. They’re called slam-clickers. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Slam...
Is it time to replace the expression “the mentally ill”? Some argue the term unfairly stigmatizes a broad range of people. Also, the winter sport of… skitching, which involves snowy roads, leather shoes — and car bumpers...
mortal lock n.— Note: A cinch, an odds-on favorite, a guaranteed thing or event. «It is a sure bet—a mortal lock as they say in the business— that if Robespierre was around today, we would be standing knee-deep in decapitations...
million-dollar block n.— «He said in the United States they’ve coined a phrase “million-dollar blocks,” clusters of apartments or houses where a million dollars each year is spent sending some people who live there to prison...