Wordwizard

A less cumbersome (and more P.C. -- hi, WoZ! I'm baaack!) version is "dressmaker's form ". I was on a tour of the costume shop at Stratford, Ontario, Canada a couple of years ago, and they called the dressmaker's form a "Jenny". Don't remember the name for the male version: maybe Gerald. Probably no...

My father has the initial J. in front of his first name. It doesn't stand for anything. Just the letter J. His mother thought it added a distinguished note . . .

Thanks for providing that link, Phil. It is so painstaking and detailed -- I admire the dedication of the author/scholar/obsessive scribbler. The section you mention, on pages 13 and 14, seems to me to support the notion that Lines of Communication are any system of roads, connecting paths, "turnpik...

Bobinwales wrote:Of course, we may delay the answer to keep you with us.

Fair enough, Bob! Thanks for getting back to me.

Outright prolonged snort, Bob.

Frosting . . . with lots of curling embellishments on it. (Ok, it's a reach.)

Stagehands shout "HEADS!" when someone drops a hammer (or anything) from the catwalk (a grid way up high in the "fly space" above the stage). They also shout it when a piece of scenery starts to teeter, or if anything dangerous happens -- especially from above. "HEADS!" means immediately cover your ...

Howdy, folks. I've dredged up this ponderous discussion because my son is writing a paper on, among other things, the origin and history of hackney-coach regulations in 17th- and 18th-century London. The topic came to him as a result of a NY Times article on The Knowledge (exam) for London taxicab o...

Those who end up hanging from a gibbet have "bought the farm" (a American idiom for dying, like "kicked the bucket"). After zmjezhd's contribution, this is the only connection I can make . . . No, that's wrong. Death and taxes, which cannot be avoided, are fixed payments (firmae). Therefore, the jun...

Hah! Good one -- I didn't see it coming at all!

Two years later: I spent the afternoon at a fantastic exhibit called "Ladies and Gentleman . . . The Beatles!" at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. It had everything -- unseen film clips, interviews, memorabilia, tour contracts, hotel bills, newspaper articles, buttons, lunch boxe...

trolley wrote:My daughter: "Oh Dad. That's an epic fail."
Me: "Why can't you kids use 'failure'?"
My daughter: "That's a good ask. Maybe you should Google it."

Outright, prolonged snort, Trolley!

In the Bible, wasn't "Ur" the name of the very first place Abraham lived with his people before he was instructed to pack it all up and go west? The ur-homeland, sorta.

. . . I got the wooden spoon many times as a youngster...I also got the hair brush, the yard-stick, and anything else that Mom could lay her hands on. It was a much simpler time. Hah! Me, too, trolley. Although, to be honest, it was merely the threat of the wooden spoon that sent us screaming to ou...

So did Manfred Mann, by way of Burt Bacharach.