The edge of the Grand Canyon. A remote mountaintop. A medieval cathedral. Some places are so mystical you feel like you’re close to another dimension of space and time. There’s a term for such locales: thin places. And: did you ever go...
During the late 19th and early 20th century, thousands of volunteers helped crowdsource the Oxford English Dictionary. This venerable reference work includes citations sent in by inventors, eccentrics, scientists and educators, an Arctic explorer —...
The owner of a yarn store in Juneau says a customer corrected her when she pointed out a special collection of buttons and said, “You should check out these ones.” Is it incorrect to say these ones instead of just these? This is part of...
casino capitalism n.— «This book’s middle chapters succinctly show how “casino capitalism” (a coinage by Susan Strange, one of the left-wing critics of the market that Green deftly cites) led from late 2007 to a...
synch license n.— «Barring an exception under copyright law, the use of a sound recording and/or composition in a film requires a license from the owner (or owners) of the copyrights. Thus, for example, for the film Donnie Darko to...
Fess up: do you have a pet name for your car? How about your computer? Martha and Grant discuss the urge to give nicknames to inanimate objects in our lives. Also, why do we speak of vetting a political candidate? And what in the world is a zoo...