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Fake English

Everyone knows you don’t start a sentence with but. But why? Also, how voice recognition technology is changing the way we think and write and what English sounds like to foreigners. Plus, where cockamamie comes from, oddly translated movie...

Paraph on Old Signatures

What do you call that embellishment at the bottom of old signatures, like the hash-marked line beneath John Hancock’s name? It’s called a paraph, originally used as a distinct mark to protect against forgery. This is part of a complete...

A-GoGo

A San Diego caller wonders about the expression a-gogo, as in the name of a local restaurant, Hash House A Go Go. Where’d it come from? This is part of a complete episode.

We Cook Off Our Potatoes (minicast)

If a restaurant menu states, “We cook off our potatoes,” what in the heck does that mean? A truck driver who encountered such an announcement at a roadside cafe is still puzzling over what it means to “cook off” a tuber. He...

hashtag

hashtag  n.— «What does it mean when somebody puts a number sign before a word in an online post? That’s called a hashtag, for the hash mark preceding the word (right, yet another name for the symbol we also call the number sign and the...

barcamp

barcamp  n.— «There’s also something called a “barcamp” or “unconference” in which participants gather in an open, unstructured environment to hash out new ideas. Then they share them with others via web channels...