I really really love the word maven. I don’t know why. It’s just something about the way it sounds, maybe, the drawn-out maaaaaaaaaay followed by the short ven. Maybe because there are few words that rhyme with it: haven, raven, shaven. Maybe I just like it. A maven, the dictionary tells us, is “A person [...]

One of my favorite etymologies (this is how you know I’m a nerd) is that of the word “heretic.” Merriam-Webster defines heretic as: 1: a dissenter from established religious dogma; especially: a baptized member of the Roman Catholic Church who disavows a revealed truth 2: one who dissents from an accepted belief or doctrine: see also NONCONFORMIST [...]

Godiva’ s new ad campaign, as seen on a poster in a Metro station: A woman in a slinky dress kneels on the floor next to an enormous chocolate box. She’s tearing the ribbon off to get to the chocolates, which are at least the size of her head. Tagline: “Let the decadence begin.” Now, [...]

flickr:Darwin Bell Gloaming “Twilight.” Actually a noun (nothing ever “gloams,” for example), the word comes from Scottish Middle English and is over 8000 years old. Fungible “Interchangeable” (in that the two fungibles perform the same function). The odd one out in this list. I just love that it sounds like so many other common words [...]

This classic Straight Dope has the skinny on the origins of the phrase “to 86.” It was, apparently, “diner code,” and Cecil Adams gives other examples. Some seem faintly ridiculous–”19 = ‘I yearn for a banana split’”–but it’s the best etymology I’ve seen for this phrase.

Flickr: laffy4k A long time ago someone suggested I write about color words. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not an artist and that most of my color knowledge comes from the Crayola Box of 64. But it’s true, color words are fascinating. For example, vermillion comes from the Latin for “little worm”–there [...]

This is something new for this blog: a plug for a book I have not actually read. But Anu Garg’s newest book, The Dord, the Diglot, and an Avocado or Two: The Hidden Lives and Strange Origins of Common and Not-So-Common Words, looks to be pretty great. Anu Garg is the guy behind the A [...]

I’ve analyzed the search terms that have been sending people my way over the past few weeks. Most of them fall under these three umbrellas: Avoid grammar errors Check your paper for plagiarism Good writing Apparently, you people just want me to help you cheat on your homework. That’s fine. This post should help anyone [...]