Gramer Girl here, I'm Mignon Fuggedy and you can think of me as your friendly guide to

the English language, writing, history, rules, and cool stuff.

Today I have a meaty middle about all the words we use to describe a vacation, and a

family-led story about why some people call green peppers mangoes.

Late July and early August are the height of vacation season in the United States.

Highways are jammed, pools are packed, and campgrounds are at capacity.

With that in mind, let's talk about the word vacation and other ways to talk about taking

time off.

The word vacation comes from the Latin word, vacat, which is the principal stem of the verb

vacare, meaning to be empty or free.

Other words that come from the same root are vacant and vacancy, as well as the obsolete

words, vacant tree, meaning idleness, and vacatour, meaning and ennullment.

Although people have surely been taking breaks since the beginning of time, the word vacation

doesn't show up in print until 1386, in Jeffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales.

In his poem, The Wife of Bath describes how one of her husbands had a book about wicked

wives.

The book tells about the most notorious wives in history, including Eve, Delilah, and

Clydeum Nestra.

The husband spends all his free time, his laser and vacation, reading the book aloud to

her as a form of torment.

And by the way, don't worry about the wife of Bath.

He winds up ripping some of the pages out of her husband's book, hitting him in the

...