Rabbit, rabbit! In this week’s episode, it’s old terms like “eleemosynary” and “logodaedaly,” and new ones like “catio.” We discuss how to pronounce “coyote,” what Brits may mean when offer you a “joint,” when “cowpie” entered English, the...
cliff effect n.— Note: Related to digital cliff. «Over-the-air digital television is an all-or-nothing proposition, Lewin said, meaning a television will either show a picture as clear as cable, or no picture at all. It’s commonly called the...
This past weekend on "A Way with Words," we mulled over whether part of the recession-busting bailouts the government is proposing should be targeted at reviving the Federal Writers' Project of the 1930s. Get a taste of that, and more...
This week’s Slang This! contestant shares his favorite slang term, teho, (To Each His Own), then tries to puzzle out the meaning of the terms karzy and low-bush moose. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Karzy and Low-Bush Moose”...
Stand back! It's another newsletter from A Way with Words. This past weekend on A Way with Words we talked about crossword puzzles. This coming weekend superstar solvers from across the continent will gather in Brooklyn, New York, to test their...
A caller from Maine says she was taught to say “bunny, bunny” at the first of each month for good luck. Then she met someone who says “rabbit, rabbit” for the same reason. What’s the superstition behind these lagomorphic locutions? This is part of a...