The word cloud comes from Old English clΕ«d, meaning βrockβ or βhill,β making it a relative of the word clod. The sense of a βhillβ or βmass of rocksβ was later applied to those vaporous hills in the sky. This is part of a complete episode.
Ian in Cincinnati, Ohio, has noticed that some words can lose one letter at a time and a meaningful word remains. For example, drama can become dram, then ram, then am, then a. The National Puzzlersβ League has several specific names for this: If...
Quiz Guy John Chaneski serves up a Common Bonds puzzle, in which the object is to guess the common idea in each of three things. For example, what’s the one word that connects a grade on a report card, USDA inspected beef, and an incline? This...
Since the late 19th century, the word scrumbunctious has been used to describe someone who is energetic or high-spirited. Scrumbunctious is probably a portmanteau of scrumptious and rambunctious. This is part of a complete episode.
In an 1899 contest sponsored by a literary magazine, a reader proposed the word whifflement to mean “an object of small importance.” This is part of a complete episode.
Why do some people pronounce the word sixth as “sikth”? This is part of a complete episode.
