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Galley-West, Collywest, and Variants

Frederick from Valdosta, Georgia, wonders about the term galley-west. To knock something galley-west means to “knock it into confusion” “send everything in all directions.” In Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry...

Sockdolager, A Knockout Punch

Micah in Council Bluffs, Iowa, reports reading an account of a fistfight between 19th-century newspaper editors in which one was hit with a sockdolager, meaning “a knockout punch” or a “heavy, decisive blow,” and wonders if...

Episode 1510

Cootie Shot

Perfect sentences and slang that tickles your mind! A new book of writing advice says a good sentence “imposes a logic on the world’s weirdness” and pares away options for meaning, word by word. • Your musician friend may refer to...

Episode 1614

Cats and Dogs

It’s cats and dogs, and a few other critters, too. Animals prowl around inside several English words, including sleuth, which was originally sleuth-hound, a synonym for bloodhound. Plus, the language we use with our pets and the ways they...

Episode 1592

You Talk Like a Sausage  

Do you refer to your dog or cat as “somebody”? As in: When you love somebody that much, you don’t mind if they slobber. In other words, is your pet a somebody or a something? Also, for centuries, there was little consistency in the...