The term skinnymalink, or a skinny marink, is one way the Scots refer to someone who’s thin. In the United States, the term goes back to the 1870’s. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Skinnymalink” Hello, you...
“If you come to a fork in the road… take it!” Baseball legend Yogi Berra was famous for such head-scratching observations. What most people don’t realize, though, is that the former Yankees star often wasn’t the first...
Corby in San Diego, California, grew up hearing Navy fighter-pilot slang from her father. A pilot who bangs off the cat launches from an aircraft carrier by catapult, and the meatball is the amber light in the optical landing system that helps line...
Would you rather live in a world with no adjectives … or no verbs — and why? Also, who in the world is that director Alan Smithee [SMITH-ee] who made decades’ of crummy films? Turns out that if a movie director has his work wrested away...
We often hear that English is going to hell in a handbasket. Actually, though, linguistic handwringing about sinking standards and sloppy speech has been going on for centuries – at least as far back as the 1300’s! And: language also...
Why is there an upstate New York but not an upstate New Jersey, or an Oklahoma panhandle but not a Missouri panhandle? Both geographic phenomena exist in those places, but the terminology varies. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of...