Ophelia in Johnson City, Tennessee, wonders about the exclamation her great-grandmother often used when something surprised her: Cat bristle! That may be her own version of a minced oath, although it fits with the idea of how a cat’s tail might look...
Quiz Guy John Chaneski’s puzzle this week involves pig Latin, a.k.a. Ig-pay Atin-lay. One of two answers to each clue is a regular English word, and the other is its pig Latin version. For example, what regular English word and its pig Latin...
Mike in Glasgow, Kentucky, wonders about a catchphrase used in British comedies: I go to the foot of the stairs. The Oxford Dictionary of Catchphrases (Amazon) compiled by Anna Farkas and several books by catchphrase collector Nigel Rees both point...
It’s hard to imagine now, but there was a time when people disagreed over the best word to use when answering the phone. Alexander Graham Bell suggested answering with ahoy! but Thomas Edison was partial to hello! A fascinating new book about...
Byron in Jacksonville, Florida, shares that when his mother was astonished, she’d say Don’t that beat all! But when really surprised, she’d exclaim, That beats bobtail and bobtail beats the devil! What’s a bobtail and how...
Nate in Tucson, Arizona, says his grandmother from Nova Scotia used to express surprise with the exclamation dear me suz! It goes back to the 1820s and is likely a form of dear me, sirs! Variants include suz alive, law me suz, oh suz alive, and law...
