I, For One, Welcome Our New Robot Overlords - 20 July 2009

[This episode first aired March 21, 2009.]

Sure, there's 'Grandma' and 'Grampa,' but there's also 'Gammy,' 'Bumpy,' 'Dadoo,' 'Gre-Gre,' 'Kiki,' 'Kerkel,' 'Monga,' 'Nee-Nee,' 'Pots,' 'Rah-Rah' and 'Woo-Woo.' Martha and Grant talk about the endlessly inventive names grandchildren call their grandparents.'They also discuss 'Seinfeldisms,' 'couch potatoes,' and where in the world your car can and will be stopped by robots. Really!

You've heard people describe something momentous as 'a watershed moment' in history. What is a watershed, exactly? Besides an Indigo Girls' song , that is.

In Ireland you'll find that some folks have an odd habit of gasping in mid-conversation. A Texan who lived in Dublin for years says he found this speech trait disconcerting. The hosts explain that this 'pulmonic ingressive' is heard other places around the world. More about ingressives here , including examples in audio clips from Sweden and Scotland.

Martha shares listener email about what to call that icy buildup in your car's wheel wells. 'Fenderbergs,' anyone?

Quiz Guy Greg Pliska has a puzzle called 'Wordrows,' a.k.a. 'Welded Palindromes.' They're two-word palindromes, in other words. For example, what two-word palindrome means 'beige bug'?

Yadda yadda yadda. Newman! No soup for you! The 1990's sitcom 'Seinfeld' popularized these expressions and more. Check out this Paul McFedries article from 'Verbatim' .

What's the origin of the term 'couch potato'? Grant has the story of the guys credited with coining this term for 'boob-tube aficionados.'

Your dining companion suddenly starts choking. Once his coughing subsides, he exclaims, 'Whew! Something when down my 'Sunday throat'!' Sunday throat? Martha explains this odd expression.

A few episodes back, Grant and Martha discussed what linguists call 'creaky voice.' Many of you wrote to ask for more examples of this curious speech trait. Here are a few , about halfway down the page.

In this week's installment of 'Slang This!,' Grant and Martha are joined by June Casagrande , author of 'Mortal Syntax: 101 Language Choices That Will Get you Clobbered by the Grammar Snobs -- Even If You're Right.' June tries to pick out the true slang terms from a group that includes the expressions 'hot wings,' 'bird farm,' 'bellybag,' and 'budget.'

When you're late for something in Johannesburg, you can always say you were 'held up by robots' and no one will think twice. That's because in South Africa, a robot is a traffic light. Check out this haunting video called 'Death of a Robot' . The hosts discuss this and other terms for those helpful semaphores.

What's the best style guide for online writing?

In William Howitt's 'Madam Dorrington of the Dene' , a character named Vincent says, 'Don't let my father be fearful of me. I will be as ravenously ambitious, and as gigantically 'work-brickle' [...] as he can desire.' Grant has the goods on the dialect expression 'work-brittle' or 'work brickle,' which means 'energetic' or 'industrious.'

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