Quiz Guy John Chaneski pitches a puzzle about the names of minor-league baseball teams. For example, which team’s name might refer either to a type of weather phenomenon or a wooden roller coaster on the Coney Island boardwalk? This is part of...
Teen slang from the South, and food words that are tricky to pronounce. • High schoolers in Huntsville, Alabama, told Martha and Grant about their slang, including a term particular to their hometown. • How do you pronounce the name of that tasty...
The Spanish term for rollercoaster, montaña rusa, or “Russian mountain,” refers to the earliest versions of rollercoasters, which were sledding Russian slopes built from wood and covered with ice. Oddly enough, the Russian for roller...
rinkrash n.— «It’s also a violent sport. The Roller Warriors’ website features the “Injury Archive,” a photo gallery of grotesque bruises, facial stitches, knee-surgery images and floor burns—commonly known as rinkrash...
roller n.— «You are going along, going along and then you see these hills which are becoming bigger. All of a sudden, you are in the hills going up and down; in biking parlance they are called rollers.» —“Namibia” by Kerri...
tumblehome n.— «We all tried to out-fin each other back in the Fifties, and we let the fat look get out of hand in the Sixties and early Seventies, when the industry got so carried away with turn-under and tumblehome that some of the cars...