If an operator operates, why doesn’t a surgeon surge? The word surgeon comes from ancient Greek cheir, which means “hand,” and ergon, “work,” surgery being a kind of medical treatment done by hand, rather than the work of drugs. These Greek roots...
Herb in Greenfield, Massachusetts, learned French as a child and wondered why à la mode, meaning “in the fashion,” came to mean ice cream on pie. The phrase comes through French from the Latin modus, “manner, fashion, or style,” and English cooks...