Joan from Dallas, Texas, wants to know why some people are judgmental about people who speak with a glottal stop in such words as cattle, bottle, or even glottal itself. She noted a commenter on TikTok criticizing a Scottish woman for pronouncing...
Jelani Cobb, a writer for The New Yorker, began a lovely thread on Twitter by asking readers to talk about their first library card. That online discussion also prompted fond memories from the hosts about the majestic main branch of the Louisville...
Paige grew up in Louisiana, where she used the term pencil colors for colored pencils. Her name for these drawing instruments is likely a calque from French crayon de couleur, literally “pencil of color.” In many small towns across the...
Paul in Camden, Maine, has adopted a new pup, and the dog’s exuberant face-licking has Paul wondering about the many meanings of the word lick, which include getting his licks in and takes a licking, which refers to the act of forcefully...
Sheree from Boerne, Texas, says her mother used to refer to leftovers as a duke’s mixture. The original Duke’s mixture was a loose, low-quality tobacco sold in a pouch by the same tobacco company that would later donate millions to the...
Michelle from Tallahassee, Florida, says that when she was a kid, she decided on the first day of kindergarten that she would tell her teacher that she went by a different name, so that’s what everyone at school called her. Imagine her...