watermelon
n.— «Major Robert D’Aubuisson, leader of the ultra right Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA), likes to compare the Christian Democrats to a watermelon. “Green (the Christian Democrats’ official color) on the outside,” he says, “and red on the inside.”» —“El Salvador: Election just a sideshow to real fight” by Oakland Ross Globe and Mail (Toronto, Can.) June 4, 1983. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
In the 15th century, the word respair meant “to have hope again.” Although this word fell out of use, it’s among dozens collected in a new book of soothing vocabulary for troubled times. Plus, baseball slang: If a batter...
Asthenosphere, a geologist’s term for the molten layer beneath the earth’s crust, sparks a journey that stretches all the way from ancient Greece to the author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Plus: What the heck is a dogberg? It’s when...