Minor Planets (episode #1639)

You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.

I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette.

Humpty-bump pull-top, diamond loops, reverse shark’s tooth.

If you overheard people talking excitedly using vocabulary like this, you’d probably wonder what in the heck they were talking about.

At least you would unless you were, well, Grant Barrett, because Grant, you know what I’m talking about.

Yes, that’s some of the language of people who do acrobatic flying maneuvers.

Yes, yes.

They describe the movements of what these daredevil pilots do in the air.

It’s like, you know how dance choreographers have a system of symbols and terms to represent the movements that they do on the ground?

Well, pilots have them for their movements in the air.

And they can spell them out in this notational system that’s called the Areste system.

It’s named for a Spanish aviator who developed a manual for pilots that described about 3,000 maneuvers, and it’s since expanded to include thousands more.

But it includes picturesque terms like the ones I mentioned, and also hammerheads and goldfish from the top.

Goldfish from the top.

So it’s called that because if you were looking down from above the maneuver, it’s in the shape of a simplified goldfish, right?

Right. Yeah. Yeah.

And, you know, what’s also interesting is that there are arrestee dances.

What are those?

Those are the movements that pilots do on the ground that help them visualize and practice for their flights.

You can watch videos of them on YouTube.

It’s really interesting.

It’s kind of these jerky movements where they look like they’re deep in thought and they’re thinking about what they’re doing, but they’re doing all these, you know, hammerheads and goldfish from the top.

We will link to some of the Arrestee dance videos and the Arrestee dictionary of the acrobatic moves that pilots have.

And if you’ve got some other interesting language or form of communication in your trade or profession, we’d love to hear about it.

You can let us know at 877-929-9673.

That’s a toll-free number in the United States and Canada, 24 hours a day.

And if you’re somewhere else or want to talk to us another way, there are lots of ways to do it.

You can find them all on our website at waywordradio.org.

Hey there, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is John Seibert from Salisbury, Maryland.

Hey, John, welcome to the show.

What’s on your mind today?

I noticed in everyday speech with my professional colleagues, which we work in a political and a legal arena, and everybody is very well spoken, but I noticed that when something needs to be prioritized in a text extra letters are added like for to make it a top priority say something like we want this account so bad like s-o-o-o bad and I was wondering if that’s a modern thing because of texting as a way to prioritize or if that’s older or if there’s an origin to it.

There’s a lot of examples that I can use.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

That’s very common.

But you do this in the office at a legal firm?

It actually more is in the informal text.

But these people are very well-spoken, so they can easily say, please prioritize this account.

But when you see, we really want this account so bad, that changes the perspective a little bit.

Yeah, yeah.

I don’t know if you know this phenomenon, but when you notice something, you notice it even more.

Like when I first called the show, eventually I’m seeing it everywhere now.

And I’m noticing that it’s used for many different things like impatience, importance, description, and things.

It can be used in the consonant or the vowel and can be used different ways.

Like you could say that really hurt with a lot of R’s.

Or you could say, that hurt so bad.

And they mean two different things.

That’s true.

Yeah, there’s a lot to say about this.

And first, it’s not new.

Second, it’s not only English.

And third, it’s not just one emotion.

It’s not just emphasis, for example, though it often is.

The French philosopher and linguist Charles Hagage wrote about this and translated into English.

He wrote about what he called the expressive lengthening of vowels, which often translates into superlatives or insistence.

And he also writes about sometimes it can be other emotions like tenderness or the speech addressed to children or a dialogue between lovers.

And so there are all these different ways that we can do this.

And then there are languages where this expressive lengthening, which is the official term in linguistics, is a feature of the language itself.

So some languages, like various Native American languages spoken in Canada, will add extra characters to change a verb tense to indicate, say, a continuing action or a past action.

And so adding more characters is about something intrinsic to the grammar of the language.

It’s pretty amazing how deep the rabbit hole goes for these extra letters.

Well, you knew who you were calling, right?

It goes way down.

It does.

I originally, when I just started thinking about the origin, I was like, well, maybe it just started with Spicoli in Fast Times at Ridgemont High.

And we just picked it up.

Well, yeah, that’s it.

So the English way that we do this, this expressive lengthening, we find it most common these days in casual uses, just like the ones that you gave us.

Of course, the fantastic book, Because Internet, by linguist Gretchen McCulloch, talks about this.

And she talks about how it’s not just the vowel, but sometimes we add extra consonants, even when we don’t pronounce those consonants, or even when it’s impossible to lengthen those consonants.

Like we might add more Gs to OMG, but you don’t really say OMG to lengthen that.

It’s strictly a visual trick.

You know, it’s strictly something for text.

It’s not something you say aloud.

But expressive lengthening can be audible or it can just be visual.

But the effect can be very similar in either case.

An example of a consonant would be something like, I am never going there again.

Yeah.

I myself have a problem adding more consonants, particularly when I think if I were to say it aloud, the vowel is the thing that I would lengthen.

But others will have no problem.

For them, it’s always the last letter, no matter what it is.

That’s the one that they stretch out to indicate that the whole word would be stretched.

Yeah, I have trouble adding vowels because, like, never if I added the E, then it would be Navier.

You want to say it as if that letter becomes more pronounced.

Most of the examples that we’ve mentioned in English so far are really about emphasis.

And their emphasis on some other emotion that has been successfully conveyed to the hearer or the reader.

That’s a really important part of the written necessity.

Because, and this is a term you’ve heard me mention on this show before, we have this very important task that we’re constantly doing in written language, which is paralinguistic restitution.

And this complicated term simply means we’re trying to do things in the written language that are very easy to do in the spoken language.

So we’re constantly trying to find new ways to indicate extreme emotion or emphasis.

Stuff that’s very easy to do with the eyebrows or hand gestures.

Like I’m waving my hand now as I’m talking and you can’t see it.

But it’s a thing that I can’t easily do in written text.

So when I’m speaking aloud, I can go, oh, how do I represent that in text?

Well, is it a bunch of A’s, U’s, and a G-H?

Maybe it is.

Well, I really appreciate it.

It’s been very educational.

John, we thank you for your time.

Give us a call again sometime, all right?

Thank you very much.

All right, take care.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Take care.

Well, John noticed something about language, and he called us.

You can do the same, 877-929-9673.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Deva and Shailen from McKinney, Texas.

Hi, Deva and Shailen.

All right, what are we dealing with here?

Sisters, mother, daughter, co-workers?

Mother, daughter, me and my wonderful 12-year-old daughter.

Oh, okay, great.

Excellent.

So which is which?

I’m Shaylin, and I’m the 12-year-old.

Okay.

I’m in seventh grade.

All right, so Shaylin, what has your mom done wrong now?

Well, we were shopping online, and we were looking for some pants, and we noticed how there was two different spellings of the word gray. So like the color gray, G-R-E-Y, and gray.

G-R-A-Y. And we wanted to know what the difference means, or is it just like, you have a preference of spelling? So G-R-A-Y versus G-R-E-Y. Did you notice a pattern at all?

I mean, personally, I’m more of the avid shopper. My daughter, we were sitting in a, waiting out a tornado in Texas per, you know, that’s normal. But so I was shopping. No, I was shopping online and looking for gray pants. And I’ve noticed a pattern that it seems that with certain, like if they’re a European merchant, that the spelling, it seems like the more English version of gray, which I think is G-R-E-Y, like Earl Gray teeth. And then for a lot of U.S. sellers, it’s G-R-A-Y, but I’ve noticed also that it’s interchangeable between brands that are stateside or international.

Martha, wonderful fieldwork, don’t you think? Yes, yes, thank you for those data points. That’s really interesting. Yeah, as you suggested, G-R-E-Y appears in British English in general, and G-R-A-Y is what you see in the United States. And a good way to remember that is that G-R-A-Y is American, G-R-E-Y is English. You see it in England, England starting with the letter E. And both of those spellings have been around for a very long time. In fact, in the mid-18th century, Samuel Johnson published his famous dictionary, and the entry for gray with an A is much, much longer than the entry for gray with an E, which is weird because now we think of G-R-E-Y as something that you’ll see in England.

And then it gets complicated even further. I mean, I think this is some of what you’re running into is that products from outside the United States often have the G-R-E-Y spelling. Like, for example, Grey Poupon Mustard. You know, that was named for a Frenchman.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

That was named for a Frenchman, Maurice Grey, whose last name was spelled G-R-E-Y. You probably haven’t read Fifty Shades of Grey. But no, but that book was published by a British author E.L. James and that gray is spelled G-R-E-Y. So you’re sort of reporting on the same kind of thing which is that we kind of get mixed messages about the spelling but generally speaking in the United States is going to be an A and elsewhere is going to be an E. There’s there’s no meaning difference between the two although some people think that there is a color difference.

Some people think that the A spelling is darker and the E spelling is lighter, and some people think the opposite. So it’s very complicated.

Deva and Shailen, thank you so much for taking time out of your day to talk with us.

Oh, thank you.

This is one of our favorite shows. We listen to it endlessly, and my daughter, she wants to say one really quick thing.

Yes, please.

Thank you for answering our question, and I love watching your show. It helps me learn about a lot of new words.

Thank you so much. Take care of yourself.

Thank you.

Bye-bye.

All right. Bye-bye.

Bye.

Bye-bye.

Bye.

It doesn’t matter what you’re doing in life. Language questions just pop up. This is the place to get the answers.

877-929-9673 is toll-free in the United States and Canada, 24 hours a day. More about what we say and why we say it. Stay tuned.

You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.

I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette.

And behold, it’s our quiz guy, John Chaneski.

Hey, John.

Behold, Eche.

Oh, angels cry.

Yes, Eche quiz guy.

Look, there he is.

It’s me.

You know, guys, I get a lot of mileage out of words that seem to indicate one thing, but actually mean something else. And this quiz is no different.

If I said I was driving along a road and I made a right, and then I drove a while longer and I made a left, I can make an argument that the second time I was returning.

I turned once.

Oh, boy.

I turned again.

That’s a return.

It’s not.

I’m not going back the way I came, but it sounds like it is.

In the National Puzzlers League, we might call this wordplay a false repetition. So I’ll read you a statement that makes it sound like I’m re-doing something, but the re-word will not be defined as doing the thing again.

Okay?

Okay.

Here, good.

Okay.

All right, here we go.

My computer wouldn’t turn on, so I kicked it down the stairs. Then I kicked it again for good measure. What was I doing the second time?

You were rebooting.

Rebooting and giving it exactly what it deserves.

Yes, rebooting.

Company is coming, so I polished my silver soup tureen. Unsatisfied, I gave it one more good wipe with the cloth. What was I doing the second time?

Repolish, reshine, re…

Rebuffing.

Yes, I was rebuffing.

Hopefully my guests won’t rebuff me, but I was rebuffing my tureen, my silver soup tureen, like I have one of those.

In the China cabinet, of course.

Yeah, for sure.

I’d heard that this type of car had a serious problem, so I phoned the company. They never picked up, so I phoned them again. What was I doing the second time?

It was an automobile recall.

You were recalling.

Yes, I was recalling.

Calling.

Though these days, retexting is on who calls anymore.

I don’t know.

I couldn’t find my lab assistant anywhere, and we had work to do. I walked the entire campus twice. What was I doing the second time?

Your lab assistant campus.

Yeah.

We had work to do.

We had studies to conduct.

I walked the entire campus.

Oh, you were researching.

Yes, I was re-searching for my lab assistant.

Yeah.

It was not easy winding up this garden hose. Then my dog knocked me back into the garage, and I had to wind it again. What was I doing the second time?

You were recoiling.

Yes, recoiling.

Oh, good one.

My dog, I got knocked back, and then I had to recoil the hose.

Very good.

So, after losing my driver’s license, I had to find a different way around town. I remembered my old Schwinn that I used to deliver newspapers with. It’s a much greener alternative. What am I doing with that old two-wheeler now?

Recycling.

I am recycling, yes.

It’s much greener to recycle.

Of course, you’re aware of my success on the bodybuilding competition circuit, of course. At one event, my muscular nemesis and I were tied so closely, the judges had us come back on stage to show off our physiques again. What did we do the second time?

Reflex.

We reflexed.

Yes, it was a reflex.

Not a reflex, but a reflex.

So there we go.

You guys did very well on this quiz that I call Not Again.

You’re not really doing things again.

Let’s replay.

That was a lot of fun.

Hey, yeah.

That’s a great idea.

We’ll do it again next week.

Sure.

We’ll talk to you next week.

Take care.

Take care.

Bye-bye.

We do like to goof around here, and we’d love to goof around with you.

877-929-9673.

All your questions and thoughts and ideas and stories about language.

Hey there, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, Martha. It’s Hillary. How are you?

Hey, Hillary. I’m fine. How are you? And where are you, Hillary?

I’m about three miles from where I grew up in Woodstock, Vermont.

Okay. All right. Hi, Woodstock.

Hi, Hillary. Welcome to the show.

Thank you. Thank you.

What’s up?

Well, I’m hoping you can help me figure out who I am. I grew up saying the word for the salad dressing the way my mother always said it, which was mayonnaise. And I persisted in that for many years, but never heard anyone else say it that way until I got to high school and I was on a skiing trip. And suddenly this very attractive ski instructor said, please pass me the mayonnaise. And I said, where did you come from? And he came from north of Boston and New Hampshire, but that didn’t solve the problem.

I recently talked to my mother’s sister, who was younger, and she said, oh, no, this did not come from Granny. Nope, this wasn’t a family thing. And finally, I moved to New York, where I had to go to a deli to get a sandwich, and they wanted to put mayo on it. And I really couldn’t say mayo. I really like mayo. So that was the end of it.

Now I say mayonnaise.

Now you say it two syllables instead of three.

Right?

Well, I say mayo when I say mayonnaise, yes.

Yeah, okay.

Even if you’re saying the full word, you say mayonnaise.

Two syllables?

Mayonnaise.

No, three syllables, I think.

Oh, okay.

All right.

I thought I heard two.

So your question is, where did you get that first pronunciation, and what’s wrong with you and your family? You know, was I just a persistent idiot? Let’s just get that out of the way.

I might tease you a little bit, Hillary, but I just want to say that pronunciation exists, and it’s real, and it’s valid, and it happens. It’s just not that common.

You’re special.

Yeah.

No.

Well, you might be special, but not for that reason. It’s just a—here’s the thing. Let’s just address mayonnaise and the oddity that is mayonnaise.

First of all, it’s a foreignism. And I don’t believe, in my professional opinion as a lexicographer and linguist, that mayonnaise has ever been completely anglicized. It still has a French flavor to it, so to speak.

Okay.

I mean, when you look at it, you know it’s foreign.

Yes.

And when you hear it said, because it’s said so many different ways, you know it’s foreign.

Yep.

So that leads to people kind of guessing a little bit and never being really sure and rolling it around on their tongues and coming out with weirdness. And that’s some of what happens.

When I look at a variety of different dictionaries, including mainstream ones and specialty ones and dialect dictionaries and some surveys on dialect pronunciations and different pronunciation maps, there are anywhere from three to 15 pronunciations of this word in North America, including Canada.

So there’s no one pronunciation of this word, but there are two main ways to pronounce it. One is three syllables. One is two syllables. They generally have the two-syllable kind of in the south of the United States and the three-syllable kind of in the north.

Around New York and New England, there’s kind of mostly a three-syllable pronunciation. But the shortened form mayo, M-A-Y-O, is treated like its own word, and it never really behaves like the longer form, no matter how you say the longer form.

Almost everyone, as far as I know, says mayo, and that’s it. Nobody says mayo.

I had no idea.

Now you do. You’re all caught up.

Yes.

Yes.

This is great.

So do you have any idea when this started, or it was just always this way?

Day one. As soon as the French showed up with mayonnaise and people started putting it on their grinders and hoagies, the chaos ensued. Immediately.

Thank you, Hillary.

Thank you both very much.

Thank you.

Take care of yourself.

Take care.

Bye-bye.

Bye.

Tasteful conversation here on A Way with Words, and you can join it, 877-929-9673.

Remember the conversation we had with Patty who wanted a term for being awake at night or that period of wakefulness when you wake up in the middle of the night and you just can’t go to sleep?

Yeah, we weren’t really sure what to call it. I think you had talked about second sleep, but that’s the second sleep. That’s not the period in between the first and second sleep.

Right, right.

And the French call it d’orvée. That prompted an email from Twyla Morris in Sacramento, California. And she said that she and her husband have a word for this, and the word is squeegee.

And she says, it’s because when we were married in the early 90s, nighttime TV would consist of those half-hour infomercials for cleaning products. If one of us woke and decided to quietly watch a bit of TV, there was invariably a show extolling the marvels of the latest miracle product.

We were fascinated that they could spend half an hour on the wonders of a squeegee. Hence our catchphrase, did you squeegee last night?

I love it. We’re always looking for family language, the stuff that only you and your loved ones say, but you’re pretty sure the rest of the world would love to use too.

We’d like to hear it, 877-929-9673, or tell us in email, words@waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Eric, and I’m from Milbank, South Dakota.

Hi, Eric, welcome to the show.

I am glad to be here. Thanks for having me. My question is about a term my grandmother used to use, my paternal grandmother, and the phrase is a Duke’s mixture. And she would use that to mean a variety of items or a hodgepodge of things, such as if you were making a stew and threw in, oh, various vegetables, all sorts of vegetables and different meats and maybe some rice pasta, whatever you were throwing in. You might call that a Duke’s mixture.

Wow, that is a Duke’s mixture. And it didn’t have to relate to food. It could be just a variety of items in something like a secondhand store. If you walked in and they had related or unrelated items of all sorts on the shelf, you could say, wow, that’s a real Duke’s mixture.

And I’ve only heard one other person use that term. And he was somebody of a younger generation who grew up in another part of the United States. And I was just wondering if you could tell me a little bit about the origin of this term.

Well, Eric, you’ve given us a great description of the use of this expression, Duke’s mixture. Would you believe it goes back to a kind of tobacco?

Interesting.

And it’s a kind of tobacco that was produced by the Duke Tobacco Company of Durham, North Carolina. Now, of course, another connection between Durham, North Carolina, and the name Duke is Duke University, which was named for this wealthy family, the Duke family, that produced tobacco there in Durham.

The company also made a tobacco you might have heard of called Bull Durham. But they also made a kind of tobacco called Duke’s Mixture, named after the family. And it was advertised with images of cowboys on horseback rolling their own, you know, taking the tobacco out of those little bags and rolling their own cigarettes.

And so it was marketed as this very masculine brand. So a Duke’s Mixture originally referred to a kind of cheap tobacco. It was odds and ends, not the best parts of the leaves. And they were sold in these little bags. And so Duke’s Mixture came to mean a hodgepodge or a mess of things, exactly the kind of thing that you were describing. And also mixed breed animals, like a mixed breed dog could be described as a Duke’s Mixture.

Wow, that is very interesting. I had no idea.

Yeah, so your grandmother wasn’t rolling her own then.

No, not that I am aware anyway.

-huh. Yeah, well, it’s become generalized since then.

No, I just found that interesting because my grandmother grew up in, spent her whole life in northeastern South Dakota. And the other gentleman was from a younger generation and he grew up in Florida. And so there I didn’t really see a connection.

Yeah, I’m kind of surprised to hear that the younger person used it because, I don’t know, Grant, I don’t think of it as a term that is that common among younger generations.

No, most people would say something like Heinz 57 or maybe not even that anymore.

Well, I’m starting to use it a little more often, so I’m reviving it.

Very good. We approve.

Well, we’re glad to have you on the show. Call us again sometime, Eric, all right?

I will. Thank you guys so much. I appreciate it.

All right. Take care of yourself. Bye-bye.

Okay. You too. Bye-bye.

I know there are more terms for a mix of things or a mess of things. 877-929-9673.

Email words@waywordradio.org.

The poet James Merrill once wrote about meeting Alice B. Toklas, and he said that he had not anticipated, quote, the enchantment of her speaking voice, like a viola at dusk.

I can picture that.

Right. I can hear it. You know, a viola at dusk. Like these harmonics, these unexpected harmonics, like two instruments playing, like the evening insects as well as the instrument.

I know that sound.

Yeah, I’m seeing colors and just a feeling, maybe a warm summer evening. I don’t know. I just love that description of someone’s speaking voice, like a viola at dusk.

What’s a passage that you’ve read that really struck you that you’d like to share with us? We’d like to see it. words@waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hey, this is Ash from Huntsville.

Hi, Ash. Welcome to the show.

After a long day’s work, and I’ll go to sit down in the chair, and my muscles will get stiff. And when you go to move again, you just sore all over, like a whole body sore. And I’ve always heard that referred to as all stove up.

I never could figure out what that was.

I even asked my mom one time, and she didn’t know, but she was like, yeah, it’s like a baseball player that’s running for the outfield fly, and he runs full steam into the wall.

It’s like the next day, he’s going to be all stove up.

I was wondering if y’all could shed some light on that with me.

All stove up.

That’s S-T-O-V-E, stove.

Yeah.

Okay.

And so if you come home at the end of a long day and you’re all stove up, you’re not feeling too good, right?

Right, right.

You’re not incapacitated, but you sure ain’t happy about it.

Right.

No, not at all.

Stove up is related to the expression to stave in.

The expression to stave in means to smash a hole into something.

And it comes from the noun stave.

You know how when you create a barrel, you have these staves of wood, you know, these strips of wood that are placed next to each other and then they’re secured with a metal band?

Yeah, it has to do with staves. And to stave in a wooden boat is to smash a hole in its side. Or you might remember that during Prohibition, Cary Nation was known for running around the country with an axe and staving in barrels of whiskey.

And to be stove up is a past form that’s the result of staving.

So if something’s stove up, it’s smashed or it’s damaged or it’s crushed, you might say, you know, if you jam your finger, you might say my finger is all stove up.

Just been hit really hard, which sounds like how you feel at the end of a long, hard day.

Right, right. Yeah, that’s very interesting. I’ve always wondered that.

Well, I’m hoping that you don’t feel all stove up very often.

Hopefully not.

I was like, the older you get, the more often it happens.

Yeah.

And sometimes a night’s sleep doesn’t help.

Yeah.

Absolutely.

Or makes it worse.

Well, I sure do appreciate the insight, y’all.

Thank you, Ash.

We appreciate it.

You be safe out there, all right?

Okay.

Have a great day.

Take care of yourself.

All right.

Bye-bye.

Take care.

Thank you.

Good luck.

Well, if you’re not stove up, we hope you’re all in for giving us a call at 877-929-9673.

That’s toll free in Canada and the United States.

24 hours a day, seven days a week.

There’s also a dozen ways to reach us on our website at waywordradio.org.

Unless you spent time on Martha’s Vineyard, you may not know what a pinkletink is.

Do you know what a pinkletink is, Grant?

No. Is this like a little pink shell on the beach?

No. A pinkletink is a little frog.

I haven’t spent time on Martha’s Vineyard, but I came across this term the other day, and I really liked it.

A pinkletink is a little bitty frog that shows up at the beginning of spring.

People sort of listen for it because that signals that the season’s changing.

And apparently you hear this word pretty much no place else but Martha’s Vineyard.

Oh, pinkleting.

That is a lovely, cute little word.

I assume it’s a cute little frog, too.

Yeah, yeah.

It comes in a range of colors, including pink, and it has a little cross on the back.

And other places, it goes by the name spring peeper or tinkle toes or pink feet.

Oh, I love it.

There are going to be a lot of cats named Tinkle Toes starting this point forward.

That’s wonderful.

What do they call the spring creatures out your way?

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No matter where you are in the world, there’s a way to reach us.

You can find them all at our website, waywordradio.org.

This show is about language seen through the lens of family, history, and culture.

Stick around for more.

You’re listening to A Way with Words.

The show about language and how we use it. I’m Grant Barrett. And I’m Martha Barnette.

There are eight planets in our solar system, but there are also lots of what we call minor planets.

Now, these are the five so-called dwarf planets plus hundreds of thousands of asteroids. In fact,

They’re estimated to be more than a million minor planets. And when astronomers discover a new one

Of these, they first assign to it a provisional combination of letters and numbers that carry

Certain information, like 2002 LM60, which tells you, among other things, that that particular

Minor planet was discovered in 2002. And then once they’ve done the calculations to confirm the orbit

Of this minor planet, it gets a permanent number. And at that point, the person who discovered the

Minor planet has up to 10 years to suggest an actual name for it. And then they submit the name

And their justification for it in a citation to an organization of astronomers who give it the go-ahead.

And there are rules for this. The name is preferably one word.

It’s no more than 16 characters.

There are no names of political figures or military events within the last century.

And astronomers are discouraged from naming a newly discovered minor planet after a family pet.

And they’re collected in something called the Dictionary of Minor Planet Names.

And it makes for some delicious browsing because it gives you a little glimpse into what these astronomers find meaningful.

You know, meaningful enough to bestow on something out there in outer space.

It turns out that there are a lot of lovers of music because there’s a minor planet called Dizzy.

You can imagine who that’s named for.

Dizzy Gillespie, sure.

Yep. Yep. There’s another minor planet named Miles Davis. All one word, Miles Davis.

Great.

Yeah, there’s a Charlie Parker, but there’s also a Fanny Hensel.

That’s all one word, Fanny Hensel.

And the citation explains that Fanny Hensel was the sister of Felix Mendelssohn.

And it says she was an accomplished composer of leader chamber music and choral pieces.

She also composed an oratorio.

And then there are other minor planet names that have to do with something personal.

For example, there’s a minor planet called Autumn.

And Autumn is named for the discoverer’s granddaughter.

And there’s one called Sheila Wolfman.

And it explains that Sheila Wolfman was one of the first child survivors of the Holocaust,

Liberated from Prague to northern England in August 1945.

And finally, I was pleased to know that there’s a minor planet named Oscar Wilde.

And the entry for that says,

The great Anglo-Irish playwright Oscar Wilde will always be remembered for this line,

We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

That’s wonderful.

I also had a great time looking at this book, and a bunch of names leapt out at me, and there were two that I wanted to mention.

Of course, many people just name their finds after themselves, and that’s fair, I guess.

But one fellow just used his last name, which is Lamb, L-A-M-B, and I just love the idea of a fluffy white rock floating through space.

There goes Lamb.

And another one, clearly a baseball fan, named it Tokyo Giants.

There’s a Tokyo Giants rock hurtling through space.

And those are both delightful.

So you can find examples of these minor planet names throughout the Internet, but we’ll also link to them from our websites.

Martha, I’m so glad that you had a good time reading that.

I had a wonderful time.

I’m going to share another couple later in the show.

That’s fantastic.

We’d love to hear how they do names wherever you are, whatever industry you’re in, or at your house, wherever you live.

And we’d love to hear your pet names, too.

1-877-929-9673 is toll-free, 24 hours a day, in the United States and Canada.

And if you’re somewhere else in the world, there are lots of ways to reach us.

Just go to our website at waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hello, I’m Sam, and I was calling with a question about water towers.

Water towers where?

Water towers in northern Illinois, St. Charles to be specific.

Okay.

Okay. Is that where you are, Sam?

Yes. Yep.

Okay.

A few years ago in my hometown, they put up a new water tower, and I was driving past it, and I was on the phone with my mother, and she asked where I was.

And I told her that I was by, quote, the big old water tower by the river.

And she stopped me to say, what are you talking about?

They just put that water tower up.

It’s not old at all.

And I was just totally gobsmacked because I have never, it never would have even occurred to me to use the phrase big old to describe something that is both big and old.

It’s always exclusively meant big for me.

And so I was curious about the origins of big old along with things like good old and grand old.

Sam, this is so good.

This is so good, Martha.

This is so good.

It’s so good.

And Sam’s been festering about this for years now.

It’s funny that you should say festering because I was just thinking like, yeah, because the example that I was going to think of, you could describe somebody who’s like, oh, yeah, he had a big old pimple in the middle of his forehead.

And it doesn’t have to be old.

It could have started yesterday.

It ain’t that old, you know.

But we use old for emphasis, right?

We use it to just kind of indicate like this staggering importance of this thing at the moment.

You know, it’s all about stressing it.

It’s about oomph, you know?

It’s about really showing its significance.

And old is something that we attach importance to.

So that’s why we toss it in there, just for a little extra drama.

Fascinating.

Yeah, so it just exemplifies whatever it’s paired with.

Yeah, yeah.

Do you know why that might be?

Because we’re kind of an emphatic people.

Really?

That’s pretty much it.

I know.

Yeah, we just, you know, for the sake of emphasis, we do this with a lot of things.

I say we meaning English speakers, but I think most humans do this.

Humans are storytellers, even to the smallest degree, even in the tiniest of sentences.

Let’s spice it up a little bit.

We throw a little extra vim and vigor in there, put a little salt on it.

But yeah, old here doesn’t mean old, and you can tell your mom I said that.

All right, I’ll pass it on, and I’ll keep adding that storytelling emphasis to my sentences.

Yeah, yeah.

Well, thank you for the insight.

I don’t know that we helped you with the water tower, but may the water flow.

Yes, yes, indeed.

Take care of yourself, Sam.

Thank you, Grant and Martha.

It’s been a pleasure speaking with you both.

Same, same.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Do you have a big old question for us?

We’d love to take it on.

877-929-9673.

We were talking earlier about the dictionary of minor planets,

And Grant, there is a minor planet that’s called Yes.

After the band?

Yes!

Of course!

That’s what it says in the dictionary.

It says, yes, a rock and roll music group has been creating music since 1968.

The band is best known for its albums The Yes Album, Fragile, Close to the Edge,

And 90125.

Yeah, people who love that band

Really love that band.

I love it.

I’m just imagining

There’s like a phonograph,

You know, an old record player

Out there somewhere

And they’re still spinning

Their records on a loop.

Well, yeah,

And I’m imagining astronomers

Going over their data

And listening to, yes,

There’s also a Procol Harum

Minor planet as well.

Oh, that’s interesting.

I wonder if they like

Spin around each other

And share gravity space.

We talk about all things

Related to language.

877-929-9673.

words@waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, my name is Eric Chonko

Calling from Harrisonburg, Virginia.

All right, well, welcome.

What can we do for you?

Well, I was talking to my daughter-in-law, Kimmy,

And she was talking about her friends

That had just sold their home

And they were going to travel Alaska

For a couple years.

And I said to her,

That’s a good way to be.

Footloose and Fancy Free. And so I was kind of wondering, I kind of know the meaning of it,

But where did it come from or how old is that saying?

Footloose and Fancy Free. What did you mean by it?

Well, for me, it meant someone that was kind of carefree, didn’t want to be tied down.

The Fancy Free, I think, kind of means you’re not attached to materials and you’re okay living with

Maybe a little bit less.

Yeah, that’s pretty much it. So the footloose and fancy free is a combo of two expressions that kind of have their own lives and their own histories before they merge in the mid-1800s.

Footloose is old. It goes back to the mid-1600s, and it’s this idea that you literally are footloose. Your feet are loose.

Imagine a horse that is not hobbled or an animal that’s not hobbled.

So if you would, say, take an animal for sale to a market, you would tie up one of their feet so that they can’t walk.

And you don’t even have to tie it to a post if you hobble a horse correctly because they can’t walk on three legs.

So they are not footloose.

They are the opposite of footloose.

And so by extension, a person who is footloose is a person who’s not hobbled and can go about freely as they wish.

I have at least eight nautical dictionaries that repeat an incorrect story about footloose that has to do with the River Thames and barges and some part of the boat being loose.

That is a false story.

So if you see a dictionary that repeats this incorrect information, footloose does not come from sailing.

Martha, this is an example of canoe again.

Canoe, right.

Do you remember the acronym?

Which is an acronym for…

Constantly attributing nautical origins to everything.

Origins to everything, right.

But the full expression for Footloose and Fancy Free shows up in the U.S. South, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Kentucky in the mid-1800s.

Fancy Free is related to this notion that you fancy someone, which has never really been an Americanism.

But if you watch British films and television, particularly historical ones, you may have run across it.

If you fancy someone, you find them attractive or find them appealing.

You have a liking for them.

And so to be fancy free is to not have that kind of burden of love’s affliction, so to speak.

You are not burdened by an attachment to people or places or things, just as you mentioned.

You don’t have to have all these things in your lives to feel comfortable.

So to be footloose and fancy free is to not be hobbled and not to have the burden of attachments to people, things, and places.

Wow.

That is fascinating.

There’s more to that than I thought.

Yeah, there’s plenty to it.

There usually is.

Yeah, there usually is.

But that’s the gist of it.

Well, gee, I fancy running around Alaska for a couple of years.

No kidding.

That sounds so fun.

Yeah, that sounds like a lifetime, the adventure of a lifetime.

Wow.

Boy, you could spend a lot more than two years exploring Alaska and never be done with it.

That’s true. That’s true.

Well, Eric, thank you so much for your time and your call. We really appreciate it.

Thank you. I appreciate it.

All right. Be well.

Good talking with you. Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Well, shake a leg and step on over to your phone and give us a call, 877-929-9673,

Or send your thoughts about language to words@waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hello, this is Glenda Laminack from Culloway, North Carolina.

How are you?

All right, Glenda, welcome to the show.

How are you?

Well, I was just going to share some of my grandmother Hunt’s interesting words.

When I was a child, she would call an umbrella a bumbershoot.

And I just still, I don’t know where she got that from.

And I would say, well, Grandma, it’s an umbrella.

It isn’t a bumbershoot.

And, you know, she said, oh, yes, no, you know, it’s a bumbershoot to me.

So I said, okay.

Well, Glenda, I wonder where she got that word.

Do you have any idea?

No, because I first heard her use it when I was nine years old.

And she was probably 80 at the time.

Okay.

And I am right at 68 right now.

But she was born in Alabama.

She lived in Alabama all of her life.

Okay.

Well, do you know that she’s not the only person who uses the word

Bumbershoot or who has used the word bumbershoot?

No, I do not.

This is a term that’s been around at least since the 1870s or so.

It might be a combination of umbrella and parachute.

And it’s an interesting word because a lot of people think that it must be a British term,

That people associate the term bumbershoot with folks in England.

But the truth is that it is an Americanism.

It started here in this country.

And there’s a writer named Ben Yagoda who’s done some digging on this.

And he found that in 1939, there were a lot of cartoons involving British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain.

And in each of those cartoons, he was carrying an umbrella.

And the New York Times kept describing his umbrella as a bumbershoot, in quotes.

And they also had in the New York Times in 1939, this editorial talking about how bumbershoot is, get this, a term that drips with poetry and magic.

They called it the mystical name, the children’s name for an umbrella.

So it’s a charming word that’s been around, right?

Yeah, so it’s been around for a long time.

So your grandmother wasn’t the only person who used it.

Well, I think I just might start calling an umbrella a bumper chute just for my grandmother.

So Martha, you mentioned the silk connection.

The silk connection?

Yeah.

Oh, parachute.

Yeah, yeah, the chute part.

May come from parachute, which are often made from silk,

And fine umbrellas were often made from silk.

So both of them have this silk canopy above your head.

So there’s a possibility that the chute part of Bumbershoot may come from parachute.

Well, that’s very interesting.

And so a question that pops up in your mind is, wait, is parachute that old?

And it is actually that old.

It itself dates from the 1700s.

The Montgolfier brothers who perfected the hot air balloon used parachutes.

So you’re going to start using Bumbershoot.

Yourself, huh? I think I probably will. Absolutely, Glenda. We endorse it. My children will say,

You know, Mom, what? In fact, I think the next time I see my son, I’m going to

Just say, well, I made sure to pack a bumper chute. Yeah, that way it won’t rain. You’re just

Carrying on a family tradition. That’s all. Yeah, keep that conversation going, Glenda.

Glenda, thank you so much for your time and your call.

Take care of yourself.

Thank you.

I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Thank you.

Bye-bye.

Okay.

Take care.

Bye-bye.

Thanks.

Bye-bye.

We wouldn’t take umbrage at all if you called our telephone number, 877-929-9673.

That’s toll-free in the United States and Canada, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

And if you’re not in those countries, you can actually call us from anywhere in the world on WhatsApp.

Of course, you can always email us words@waywordradio.org.

We were talking earlier about minor planets, and it turns out there’s a minor planet that’s named Sumaura,

And that is named for the oldest private elementary school in Kobe, Japan.

It was suggested by the discoverer’s son.

Can you imagine your mom or your dad is an astronomer and you get to name this minor planet after your elementary school?

That would be amazing.

I wonder what else he thought to do, the child.

-huh.

Right.

He’s like, well, it could be this anime character or the name of my school.

Suma Ura.

877-929-9673.

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Engineer and editor Tim Felten,

And quiz guide John Chaneski.

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Go to waywordradio.org contact.

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A Way with Words is an independent production of Wayword, Inc.,

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Special thanks to Michael Breslauer, Josh Eckels, Clare Grotting, Bruce Rogow,

Rick Seidenwurm, and Betty Willis.

Thanks for listening. I’m Martha Barnette.

And I’m Grant Barrett.

Until next time, goodbye.

Bye. you