Claire from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, shares a phrase dear to her late friend. Her friend was known for saying since Christ left Philadelphia, meaning “a very long time ago.” This expression fits a well-worn pattern of comic hyperbole using...
Quiz Guy John Chaneski’s puzzle is about animal anatomy, specifically nouns and adjectives formed by combining the name of an animal with another word. For example, what zoologically-related noun is associated with the idea of “a high...
Quiz Guy John Chaneski’s puzzle plays on the phrase haters gonna hate to describe people who are just going to do what they’re going to do. Foollowing that pattern, for example, what phrase would you apply to those teens out there at the...
Crossword-puzzle constructors often employ words with a vowel-consonant-consonant-vowel pattern, or VCCV. That’s the cruciverbal inspiration Quiz Guy John Chaneski’s VCCV puzzle. For example, if the clue is teen woe, what’s the four-letter answer...
A fluke print is the pattern a whale’s tail leaves on the surface of the water. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Fluke Print” I came across a cool word the other day, fluke print. This is the record of all the...
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...