Polly, a library worker in Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, wonders about the correct term for the fuzzy puffball atop a warm hat. Is it a tribble or a pompom? The word tribble first appeared in the classic Star Trek episode “The Trouble with...
If you’re between the ages of 10 and 19, you’re a denarian. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Denarian” I promised earlier to share with you the term for someone who’s ages 10 through 19. Yeah, yeah...
Steve from Louisville, Kentucky, asks about pipe down, meaning “shush,” and his playful variation pipe up, which he uses with his child instead of phrases like “man up.” The expression pipe down comes from nautical practice: a ship’s bosun (or...
Our Quiz-Man John Chaneski has a game about the Batman villains who didn’t make the cut. All of their names end in -er, like The Matchmaker and The Firecracker. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Super Hero Word...
The die is cast has nothing to do with dye in water or a metal mold. The die is the singular of dice, and cast here means thrown, the older sense still found inside broadcast and podcast. Brian in Indianapolis ran into the phrase as the title of a...
grup n.— «Also known as yupster (yuppie + hipster), yindie (yuppie + indie), and alterna-yuppie. Our preferred term, grup, is taken from an episode of Star Trek (keep reading) in which Captain Kirk et al. land on a planet of children who...