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Pawburst

A listener from San Diego, California, sent us two terms: pawburst, which happens when a cat reaches out to stretch, and head-to-hat ratio, or the number of jobs one person has to juggle. This is part of a complete episode.

Pole-Splitting Superstition

It’s a common superstition: do not split a pole. That is, if two people are walking down the street, they shouldn’t each walk around a different side of a lamppost, telephone pole, or mailbox. But if they do, there’s a remedy: just...

Prefix “Hella”

Whether it’s bytes of data or intergalactic distances, humans are accumulating ever more massive amounts of data. But how do we use language to describe such mind-bogglingly huge numbers? There’s mega, as in mega-millions, and giga, as...

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