Now that my children are grown, I can’t remember the last time I used the word “oops.” Sure – it’s part of my vocabulary, but I have never spent any time considering its various implications.  Until of course, last week when Rick Perry was floundering around trying to remember the three US departments that he…

My interest in idioms was prompted by an offhand comment by my cousin Susie who remarked that she had enjoyed a slim volume called “Hog on Ice,” which provided derivations for common American idioms.  I then began to notice that our conversation is peppered with colorful idioms that must bedevil anyone aspiring to be bilingual…

In my second year of medical school, I subscribed to an odd little periodical called “Disease-a-Month,” basically a Cliff Notes for the aspiring doctor.  Each month the bright yellow pamphlet would provide a summary of the most salient facts about a particular ailment: diabetes, asthma, hypertension, etc.  One day, I was surprised to open the…

The quick trip to the grocery store was pathetically mundane.  I was simply there to pick up the ingredients to make chocolate chip cookies, but at the egg case I found myself caught in a morass of conflicting humane, ethical, economic and nutritional decisions.  I normally reach for the standard Grade A large eggs, but…

A while ago I wrote about the specialized vocabulary shared by seasoned crossword puzzle aficionados – words that tend to have a lot of “e’s” in them, like epée and ewer, essential to the crossword fill surrounding the theme words.  I have come to know exactly what these words mean, even though they have no…

April 1978 was a watershed momemt when I first time that I completed an entire Sunday NY Times.  Finally I felt that I could legitimately call myself a cruciverbalist.  Since then, the Sunday NYT crossword has become a weekly ritual, supplemented with crossword anthologies for long plane rides and vacations. That achievement 33 years ago is more meaningful…