A lexical lagniappe at a gas pump leads to a discussion of the word serendipity, coined by 18th-century writer Horace Walpole. This is part of a complete episode.
Burqueño slang, spoken by residents of Albuquerque, New Mexico, includes such expressions as umbers, said ominously when someone’s caught doing something wrong, as well as get down, meaning “to get out of a vehicle” and put gas for...
Grant came across a lovely discussion on Metafilter about ways to denote farting. His two favorites: making a little wish, and love puff, used at that point in a relationship where you feel okay passing gas in front of your significant other. This...
In the 1930’s, the catch phrase Now you’re cooking with gas, meaning “you’re on the right track,” was heard on popular radio shows at the behest of the natural gas industry, as part of a quiet marketing push for gas-powered...
sputter v.— «A thin gas of electrically charged particles called a plasma, the solar wind blows constantly from the surface of the sun at some 250 to 370 miles per second (about 400 to 600 kilometers/second). According to Slavin...
Does the expression to boot, as in “I’ll sell you this Hummer and throw in a free tank of gas to boot,” have anything to do with booting up a computer? This is part of a complete episode.