Dear Richard Lederer: Your column on Janus-faced words, words that contain opposite meanings within themselves, got me thinking about the many inconsistencies of the English language. Take the word far being used as an adverb. How come we always have to add -ly to adjectives to make adverbs, but not in this case? “He has […]
The recent release of the powerful film A Quiet Passion, starring Cynthia Nixon as Emily Dickinson inspires me to share with you my passion for my favorite 19th century American poet. When she died on May 15, 1886, no one alive, least of all she herself, dared imagine that she would become recognized as one […]
Dear Richard Lederer: I swear this is true. A radio reporter recently announced, “Police surrounded a house and ordered out a man accused of killing a convenience store clerk with a megaphone.” No word on whether cause of death was blunt force or burst eardrums. –Garry Foster, Carlsbad Garry Foster offers a spot-on example of […]
This coming Tuesday, the Miami Marlins will host the 2017 All-Star game. Many of us fondly recall bygone days in which baseball players were anointed with colorful nicknames. San Diego’s native son Ted Williams, for example, was variously dubbed the Splendid Splinter, the Kid, Teddy Ballgame and the Thumper. Similarly George Herman Ruth took on […]
To a foreigner, a Yankee is an American. To a southerner, a Yankee is a northerner. To a northerner, a Yankee is a New Englander. To a New Englander, a Yankee is from Vermont. And to a Vermonter, a Yankee is someone who eats apple pie for breakfast. But how did the word Yankee […]
Throughout history, the number three has held great power and fascination for humankind. We think about time as past, present and future. We divide our days into morning, noon and night; our meals into breakfast, lunch and dinner; our government into executive, legislative and judicial; the elements into solid, liquid and gas; our world […]
All hands on deck! This coming Wednesday we’ll celebrate World Handshake Day, which spotlights one of the most common greetings between two people. Handshakes have been used since at least the second century B.C. as a gesture of peace showing that the two hands hold no weapons. In The Social Conquest of the Earth, […]
Dear Richard Lederer: I bought a T-shirt from the Mill Dog Rescue, for which I foster. Emblazoned on the front is the statement “It was us who let the dogs out.” My daughter and I agree that the grammar is wrong because the us doesn’t feel right. However, I don’t know how to correct it […]
The average person speaks at a rate of 120 to 180 words per minute. Professional newsreaders speak at around 150 wpm. Women speak an average of 7.000 to 30,000 words a day and men an average of 3,00 to 12,000 words a day. That’s because women devote more brain power to conversation, speak more […]
May 29, two days from now, marks the centennial of the birth in Brookline, Mass., of John Fitzgerald Kennedy, our 35th president, at 43 and 7 month the youngest ever to be elected to that position. Many of us recall the assassination and funeral of President Kennedy more than a half century ago. Those events […]