You don’t really need those little rivets on your blue jeans. Those flat metal disks are leftovers from an earlier time, when jeans had to be much more durable. Such decorative elements that no longer serve a practical purpose are called...
The lingo of metal detectorists is full of colorful terms: A coinball is a clot of earth with a coin in it, a nighthawk is someone who detects without a permit under cover of darkness, a gold dance is a gleeful jig upon discovering precious metal...
In the metal-detecting world, a joke tag is a piece of metal inscribed with the jokester’s initials and buried in an area where other detectorists are searching to prank fellow hobbyists. This is part of a complete episode.
Mudlark: In Search of London’s Past Along the River Thames (Bookshop| Amazon) relates the amazing tale, told many places, of Thomas James Cobden-Sanderson, a bookbinder who developed the famous Doves Type. To prevent the moveable type from...
The autocomplete function on your phone comes in handy, of course. But is it changing the way we write and how linguists study language? Also, suppose you could invite any two authors, living or dead, to dinner. Who’s on your guest list and...
David in Austin, Texas, wonders if smithereens, meaning “bits” or “fragments,” as in explode into smithereens, refers to little bits of metal left over from blacksmithing. Actually, the origin of smithereen is uncertain...