Rod in LaPorte, Indiana, has Welsh ancestry, and always wondered if the expressions to welsh on a bet suggests that the Welsh are dishonest. The verb to welsh and the noun welsher are indeed mild ethnic slurs. To welsh dates back to at least the...
Kevin, a longtime vegetarian in St. Louis, Missouri, queasily recounts how he accidentally ordered sweetbreads in a fancy restaurant, thinking they were some kind of deep-fried bread, only to discover that it’s a kind of meat — a thymus gland...
Hi, all! In this week's archive edition, we discuss classic children's books, Faulknerian language, the double meaning of "sanction" and other Janus words, and a newcomer to Texas wants to talk like his neighbors: Summer reruns are...
boskin n.— «Born in the Carmarthenshire village of Bancyfelin, he spoke only Welsh when the family moved to Carmarthen in 1947, where the monoglot English speakers of the town referred disparagingly to country dwellers as...
sauce shelf n.— «Half-man-half-Vera-Duckworth Lisa went topless in the pool for a drunken dip. Red-blooded male viewers reportedly averted their gaze as the hatchet-faced Welsh whinger unloaded her sauce shelf.» —“Action stations in...
genny n.— «His generator, or “genny,” as he called it, was not strong enough to support a washing machine, which was a major headache for his family.» —“Power only recently brightens small Welsh community” by...