Martha from Tallahassee, Florida, remembers hearing older relatives announce they were going for their constitutional, a term that traces back to Latin constitutio, meaning “character,” “disposition,” “nature,” or “the essence of a thing.” Its...
Bockety is an adjective, probably from Irish, now entered in the Oxford English Dictionary. It can describe a person who has trouble walking or an object that’s gone rickety or run-down: my bockety old chair, say, or a bockety knee that won’t quite...
People who are pigeon-toed walk with their toes pointed inward, also referred to as in-toe walking. Walking with toes pointed out is called out-toe walking, or walking duck-footed. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Pigeon-Toed...
Tom in Canton, Texas, remembers fellow high school students in Israel saying in Arabic that they were taking bus number 11, a joking way to mean walking. The image is right there in the numerals: the two straight 1s look like a pair of legs, much...
Sarah in Fairbanks, Alaska, has a term to add to our discussion about colloquial terms for traveling on foot, like shank’s mare, chevrolegs, and getting a ride with Pat and Charlie: taking the shoelace express. This is part of a complete...
Andrea from Reno, Nevada, submits yet another term for traveling by foot: taking the ten-toed mule. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Take the Ten-Toed Mule” Following up on our conversation about different ways to...