Straight and Narrow - 16 June 2025

A Way with Words - language, linguistics, and callers from all over

A Way with Words

Education, Language Learning, Society & Culture

4.6 • 2.1K Ratings

🗓️ 16 June 2025

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

English spelling is a hot mess, even for native speakers. But as a new book shows, would-be spelling reformers, including Benjamin Franklin and Theodore Roosevelt, eventually just gave up. Also, what do you call your fellow parent in front of the children? Do you use the same word when the kids aren’t around? And: baseball announcers may refer to a fastball as high cheese, but the reason has nothing to do with dairy products. Plus, “Mairzy Doats,” straight and narrow vs. straightened arrow, a puzzle about sound switcheroos, cuando la rana crie pelos, a cute kid coinage, geehaw, quid, teknonomy, books with great opening lines, and lots more. Hear hundreds of free episodes and learn more on the A Way with Words website: https://waywordradio.org. Be a part of the show: call or text 1 (877) 929-9673 toll-free in the United States and Canada; elsewhere in the world, call or text +1 619 800 4443. Send voice notes or messages via WhatsApp 16198004443. Email [email protected]. Copyright Wayword, Inc., a 501(c)(3) corporation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.8	Amazon offers term time working to their employees, like Anton,
0:07.4	who's home to look after his daughters during their holidays.
0:10.0	Hello!
0:10.8	To him, this is the best sound in the world.
0:17.2	Actually, maybe that's the best sound of all.
0:23.1	Now that's term time working.
0:24.5	Offered at Amazon.
0:26.8	Ten weeks off guaranteed per year.
0:29.0	Mix of paid holiday and unpaid time off.
0:29.8	Conditions apply.
0:33.9	You're listening to Away with Words, the show about language and how we use it.
0:35.1	I'm Grant Barrett.
0:36.7	And I'm Martha Barnett.
0:39.3	We asked for your favorite opening lines from books, and boy did you all deliver. We heard from Tim Lancelot in Pueblo, Colorado.
0:45.0	He said, I immediately thought of a line I read as a fifth grader in the 1970s, and surprisingly,
0:50.9	it was still unchanged in my memory. It goes, the great fish moves silently through the night water, propelled by short sweeps of its crescent tail.
1:00.6	Do you know what that is, Grant?
1:02.4	Oh, I don't know.
1:04.0	That sounds mysterious.
1:05.8	It does, doesn't it?
1:08.0	Oh, is it Jaws?
1:08.7	Yes, yes.
	...

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