There’s a word for the first person to walk through your door on New Year’s Day. The word is quaaltagh, and it’s used on the Isle of Man. This Manx term is one of many linguistic delights in a book Martha recommends for word...
The months of September, October, November, and December take their names from Latin words meaning “seven,” “eight,” “nine,” and “ten.” So why don’t their names correspond to where they fall in...
A sneck is a kind of latch. A listener in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, says his British relatives sometimes use the term snecklifter to mean “a gift that will get you in the door at a dinner party.” This is part of a complete episode.
Try this tricky puzzle: Take the words new door and rearrange their letters into one word. This is part of a complete episode.
A door divided across the middle so that the bottom half stays closed while the top half opens is known as a Dutch door, a stable door, or a half-door. Some people informally call it a Mr. Ed door, named after a TV series popular in the 1960’s...
Sure, it’s scary to send your writing to a literary agent. But pity the poor agent who must wade through hundreds of terrible query letters a week! One of them shares excerpts from those hilariously bad query letters on a blog called SlushPile...