TTWWADI, (pronounced “tee-tee-waddy”) serves as a useful bit of shorthand for That’s The Way We’ve Always Done It. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “TTWWADI” On our Facebook page, Sandy Wolf...
Manuel in Fort Worth, Texas, wonders about a phrase he’s heard from his dad and uncles: Cut me a husk, meaning “Give me a break.” The term apparently evolved from slang used by U.S. Marines serving in Vietnam, and HUS, a designation for certain...
Obstetricians use the term multip as shorthand for multiparous, the adjective describing a woman who has given birth to more than one child. A woman who is nulliparous has not given birth at all, and a primipara has given birth only once. This is...
Patricia in San Diego wonders why POTUS, FLOTUS, and SCOTUS suddenly seem everywhere. SCOTUS appears in an 1879 Phillips Code manual for telegraph operators, while POTUS grew naturally from POT, President of the, plus U.S. It is found in print by...
A married couple has invented a lovely word to mean “I sympathize” that doesn’t sound quite so stilted. They simply say, salma. It’s an example of the private language couples develop. This is part of a complete episode...
Writers and where they do their best creative work. A new book on Geoffrey Chaucer describes the dark, cramped, smelly room where he wrote his early work. Which raises the question: What kind of space do you need to produce your best writing...