In English, if we want to say that something will never occur, we say it’ll happen when pigs fly or when hell freezes over. In Spanish, you can express this idea by saying it will happen “when cows fly,” or el día que las vacas...
A young woman in Las Cruces, New Mexico, is conflicted after a professor writes a glowing recommendation for her that also describes her as sassy. Isn’t sassy a gendered term that should be avoided? And if so, how should she handle the...
A San Antonio, Texas, listener recalls hearing the term las caniculas to denote a period of 12 days in January where the weather seems to run the gamut of all the kinds of weather that will be experienced in the coming year. This period is also...
A Las Vegas, Nevada, listener says her South Dakota-born mother always refers to supper as the last meal of the day and dinner as the largest meal of the day. It’s caused some confusion in the family. Linguist Bert Vaux has produced dialect...
Parse this bookmash as you will: Making Love / Getting Busted / Memento Mori / Leaving Las Vegas / In Guilt and Glory. This is part of a complete episode.
petrodictator n.— «If oil were $50 a barrel, the $50 tax needed to achieve the price floor would go to America’s government for fuel energy programs, not to foreign “petrodictators,” as he calls them.» —“Say you want a...