Samuel Butler once likened definitions to a kind of scratching. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “A Kind of Scratching” The English writer Samuel Butler once wrote, Definitions are a kind of scratching and generally...
Scratch an itch is standard, and it’s much more widely accepted than using itch transitively, as in itch my back. Robin in Paris, Virginia, has a movie-night wager riding on the question because his wife insists that the hand does the scratching and...
gated adj.— «The new study suggests that itch, like pain, may be a “gated” system in which signals from other nerve cells can interfere with or moderate the sensation. Scratching the skin near, but not directly on, the spot that itches...
chicken tractor n.— «A chicken tractor is basically a bottomless cage or pen of some kind. This is so the chickens can scratch (a chicken’s raison de etre) and eat off of the ground such things as grass, weeds, bugs, etc. In the U.K...
gleek v.— «What is gleeking? It is when you can spray a stream of liquid from underneath your tongue. Sometimes, you may have done it by accident while eating a sour candy—liquid does a quick spray from underneath your tongue. But I can...