Wigs on the Green

You’re listening to A Way with Words. I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette, and it’s time for Slang This, our puzzle about slang.

Today’s contestant is Sarah Lynn Ferrara from San Diego.

Sarah Lynn, come on down!

Oh, great. Hello. How are you?

Doing great. How are you doing, Sarah Lynn?

I’m doing great.

Are you psyched?

I’m psyched. I’m ready.

Okay. Well, Sarah Lynn, as you know, to get past door number one in this challenge, you have to share your favorite slang expression with us.

So, Sarah Lynn, what would that be?

When I use quite often, it’s in a nutshell.

In a nutshell.

Yeah, that’s it.

And why do you like that?

It just sums things up for me.

People know when I’m done with my thoughts.

I like that.

You know, I did some research on that phrase a while back, and I think it might come from the idea of trying to scribble something very small in a nutshell, like the Iliad or something.

I don’t know why that’s… that used to be a passion of people, right?

You get publicity because you wrote the Lord’s Prayer on the head of a pen or on a pearl or something.

Something like that, yeah.

And then you would write whole long things in microscopic type inside a nutshell.

I don’t know what you would do with it after that.

Yeah.

Yeah, I think there’s a connection there.

Well, anyway, we’ll have to look that one up and refresh our memories.

Well, Sarah Lynn, we’re going to go on to your next challenge.

Grant’s going to present you a slang term, and then he’s going to give you three possible examples of how it might be used in a sentence.

But only one of those is real, and your job will be to choose the real slang term.

And if you need help, Sarah Lynn, I’ll be here offering moral support, okay?

Just moral support.

Just moral.

Okay.

No checks.

All right, here we go.

The first expression today, Sarah Lynn, is wigs on the green.

That’s four words, W-I-G-S-O-N-T-H-E-G-R-E-E-N, wigs on the green.

And the first clue is, I am a Conley.

I’ll have to be getting home now.

It’ll be wigs on the green with me, missus.

Her mom’s come for a stay, and I’m expected home before supper.

I know.

That’s horrible, and I apologize to the British people for that.

I said British because it’s hard to tell whether that was actually Scots or Irish.

Those people over there.

I thought it was Irish at first, but British will do.

All right.

Here’s the second clue.

Once derided as the Wigs on the Green Circuit, the Senior PGA Championship Tour is now one of the most successful in the country.

And the third clue.

Nah, nobody calls them dead presidents or Benjamins anymore.

These days, if you’re really hip, you call greenbacks Wigs on the Green.

So is it A, a fight or a difference of opinion?

Is it B, the PGA Seniors Golf Tour?

Or is it C, paper money?

Whoa, Sarah Lynn, what do you think?

Let’s go.

Let’s do A.

You think it’s a fight or difference of opinion.

Are you Googling the answer?

Am I what?

No, I wouldn’t do that.

Although that’s a good idea.

Hold on a second.

I’ve got a big red switch here.

I can turn off the whole Internet.

I’ll do that.

Now, Sarah Lynn, why would you guess that?

Why would you guess wigs on the green is a fight?

You know, it was a process of elimination.

I don’t think it had anything to do with the PGA.

It was just a guess.

You don’t think they wear wigs in the PGA?

I mean, they have those sort of ugly pants.

Yeah, that’s right.

That’s right.

Ugly moving jackets.

But I think A was that accent, that British accent, right?

Because I worked so hard at being so awful.

Yeah.

I just wanted to, you know, acknowledge.

I wouldn’t have exposed my, I wouldn’t have been so embarrassing, right?

Exposed my bad acting skills if it wasn’t correct.

You have to do that for a reason.

You wouldn’t, I mean, that must be the answer, because why else would you have done that?

Oh, very well.

You’re 100% correct, Sarah Lynn.

It is indeed the answer.

Wigs on the green, to have wigs on the green means to have a fight or difference of opinion.

Think about the old days when gentlemen wore powdered wigs, and if they got into a fight, they would be all askew, right?

And they’d be on the green, which means, you know, in the common area of town or on the grass or what have you.

Wow.

All right, here’s one more for you.

This term is fake-a-bake, and I’ve written it as F-A-K-E hyphen A hyphen B-A-K-E, fake-a-bake.

And the first clue is, nobody’s going to know that you went the fake-a-bake route with dinner.

Just sprinkle a little flour on your shirt and make some good coffee.

They’ll think you baked the Madelines yourself.

And the second clue, the ads for the fake-a-bake creams make it seem like your tan will be natural.

But when you come out looking like a bag of carrots, who’s not going to notice?

And the third clue.

What do you mean fake-a-bake?

Dude, he said it was weed.

I asked for a dime bag and he gave me this.

How’s I supposed to know that it was oregano?

So there are your three clues.

Is it A, passing off desserts from a bakery as something you baked yourself?

Is it B, sunless tanning using chemicals or lotions, or is it C, legal cooking herbs sold as marijuana?

Not that you would know about number three.

No, that’s just way beyond me.

But I think I could be wrong when I use this slang, but I would say it’s B, a fake tan.

Because I’ve used that before, but maybe, you know, I said it’s a fake abacus.

Indeed it is, absolutely correct.

It is B, sunless tanning using chemicals or lotions, sometimes just called fake bake or baking a fake or something like that.

A lot of different variants on that.

But it makes sense because you’re exposing your – you’re not actually under the sun, so it’s a fake way of baking yourself.

I don’t know, whatever.

Yes, it’s B.

Good.

That’s all.

Nicely done, Sarah Lynn.

You got two for two, and you’re the slang hero of the day.

So that’s it?

There’s no more?

No, that’s it.

Do you want some more?

I’ll make some up on the spot.

Wow.

What did I win?

You won a year’s fun a free phone call that’s great and one was a guess a kind of a guess.

Yeah, you did, you did wonderfully, and for playing our game, we’re going to send you a year’s supply of fake-a-baked creams.

Great, I want a dark, dark tan please.

Do you okay?

They’re like a Latin tan, you know?

-huh.

Yeah.

Well, that was fun.

I enjoyed that.

Thank you all.

Yeah, well, thank you.

And I tell you what, really, we’re going to send you a copy of Grant’s book.

It’s called The Oxford Dictionary of American Political Slang.

Ooh, wow, that I would enjoy.

Yeah, Sarah Lynn, that’s perfect for an election year, huh?

Exactly.

That’s just what I was thinking.

All right.

Well, thanks for playing.

Hey, thank you, guys.

Thank you.

Bye-bye.

Bye.

And if you’d like to play our slang game on the air, call us.

The number is 1-877-929-9673.

Or send us an email to words@waywordradio.org.