“When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” This and other phrases of wisdom are known as antimetabole, from the Greek for “turning about in the opposite direction.” Certain forms of these statements also go by the name...
Is that a winklehawk in your pants? A listener shares this word for those L-shaped rips in your trousers, from an old Dutch term for “a carpenter’s L-shaped tool.” And Grant has a new favorite term, motherwit, meaning “the...
yo-yo skiing n.— «Last night, the bus driver asked us where we lived, which led to a lively conversation about skiing, his many ski visits to Snowmass (which he enjoyed), his condo at Snowbird in Utah and what he referred to as “yo-yo...
Pass the Gatorade! Martha and Grant work up a sweat in this episode as they tackle a sports quiz and lob vocabulary questions back and forth. They also settle a family dispute about the pronunciation of eco-friendly and unlock the etymology of...
A husband and wife ask for wisdom about a long-running dispute: Is it last-stitch effort or last-ditch effort? This is part of a complete episode.
Howdy, pilgrims! This week in the A Way with Words podcast, discover the joys (and temptations!) of two new books of collected wisdom: "The Yale Book of Quotations" edited by Fred Shapiro, and James Geary's "Guide to the...