What we’re reading: Crystal Wilkinson, a member of the Affrilachian Poets, is author of The Birds of Opulence, a quiet, lyrical novel about relationships between family members, and between humans and nature, about things said and unsaid with...
Shawn, who lives in Washington State, is used to hearing the phrase right up your alley to describe something that’s particularly fitting for someone. Then she heard a British vlogger use the phrase right up your street in the same way. Since...
Some countries have strict laws about naming babies. New Zealand authorities, for example, denied a request to name some twins Fish and Chips. • Halley’s Comet seen centuries before English astronomer Edmund Halley ever spotted it...
A young woman wants a family-friendly way to describe a statement that’s fraudulent or bogus, but all the words she can think of sound old-fashioned. Is there a better term than malarkey, poppycock, or rubbish? Also, listeners step up to help...
A young woman from Portland, Oregon, seeks a noun to denote something fake or otherwise dubious. She doesn’t want an obvious swear word, but also doesn’t like the ones she found in the thesaurus. She thinks malarkey, poppycock, and flim...
Right off the bat, it’s easy to think of several everyday expressions that derive from America’s pastime–including “right off the bat.” The Dickson Baseball Dictionary catalogues not only those contributions but also...