Remlap, Alabama and Trebloc, Mississippi are examples of ananyms — names formed by spelling a word backward, making them a kind of anagram. In the case of the Alabama town, it’s named after the Palmer family, and the Mississippi town is named...
James from Trabuco Canyon, California, learns that there’s a proper way to spell the letters of the alphabet. The letter J is spelled jay and H is spelled aitch. His own name would be spelled out as jay aye em ee ess. The letter Y is spelled...
The intentional misspelling of business names to attract attention is sometimes known as sensational spelling or divergent spelling. This is part of a complete episode.
Lawrence from San Antonio, Texas, wonders if spelling is a factor in the different meanings of awful, which describes something negative, and awesome, which describes something positive. Spelling doesn’t come into play here; in fact, for years...
Eben, a chef in Lummi Bay, Washington, who blogs about food at UrbanMonique, is curious about the term caster sugar, which denotes sugar less fine than powdered sugar, but less coarse than the regular table variety. The name caster sugar derives...
Can language change bad behavior in crowded places? The Irish Railway system has launched an ad campaign to encourage passengers to be more generous at boarding time. For example, have you ever rummaged through your belongings or pretended to have...