An ornithologist says there’s a growing movement to change the name of a pink-footed bird currently called the flesh-footed shearwater. The movement reflects a growing understanding that using flesh-colored for “pink” fails to...
The advice keep your dauber up or keep your dobber up is intended to encourage someone who’s feeling dejected or discouraged. It may come from the game of marbles, where a dobber is the largest marble in a game. This is part of a complete...
The adjectives canine and feline refer to dogs and cats. But how does English address other groups of animals? Plus, cabin fever has been around much longer than the current pandemic. That restless, antsy, stir-crazy feeling goes back to the days...
The title of the 1918 novel Cabin Fever, by B.M. Bower, references the term then widely used in the American West to denote the restless feeling of being cooped up too long in a cabin all winter. A synonym for cabin fever is shanty fever. On the...
She sells seashells by the seashore. Who is the she in this tongue twister? Some claim it’s the young Mary Anning, who went on to become a famous 19th-century British paleontologist. Dubious perhaps, but the story of her rise from seaside...
Jennifer in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin, has been in recovery from substance abuse for 29 years now, and still recalls some of the slang she heard back in the days when she was using illicit drugs. Her ex-husband used to say Now you got my nose open...