Hannah from Shreveport, Louisiana, is curious about Cooter Brown, a name she’s often heard applied to someone behaving mischievously. Cooter Brown shows up in several expressions, including drunk as Cooter Brown, high as Cooter Brown, and fast as Cooter Brown. Sometimes it appears as Cootie Brown. Langston Hughes has used the expression in his work. Just who is Cooter Brown, though? That’s unclear, although it may be related to the expressions drunk as a cooter, drunk as a coot, or drunk as a cootie. This is part of a complete episode.
A Winter Dictionary (Bookshop|Amazon) by Paul Anthony Jones includes some words to lift your spirits. The verb whicken involves the lengthening of days in springtime, a variant of quicken, meaning “come to life.” Another word, breard, is...
Rosalind from Montgomery, Alabama, says her mother used to scold her for acting like a starnadle fool. The more common version of this term is starnated fool, a term that appears particular to Black English, and appears in the work of such writers...
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