A listener from Richmond, Virginia, remembers an old game called buckeye that consists of metaphorically pulling someone’s leg, then calling Buckeye! and tugging one’s own lower eyelid. Martha suggests that it may be related to a 19th...
Why do we speak of trying to egg on a person, meaning to urge them to do something? Martha explains that the egg in this case has nothing to do with chickens. This kind of “egg” is derives from an old root that means to “urge on...
O heavy lightness! Serious vanity! Misshapen chaos of well-seeming forms! Andrew in Dallas enjoys oxymorons, expressions that yoke contradictory ideas into a single phrase. The word oxymoron is from Greek for “pointedly foolish,” and everyday...
A cowboy loves a ranch that’s pecorous, meaning abundant with cattle. Just something worth knowing. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of ““Pecorous” Means Abundant with Cattle” If you ever need a word meaning abundant with...
It’s always fun to catch moviemakers’ blunders. Say you’re watching an epic about ancient Rome and spot a toga-clad extra who forgot to remove his wristwatch. That’s an anachronism. But what do you call something that’s...
Catherine from Dallas asks about I don’t cotton to, meaning something isn’t to one’s taste or that someone doesn’t get along with it. The expression is often heard as Southern US English, but the verb cotton goes back hundreds of years in England...