In the American West, wildfires have become both more frequent and more destructive. With this ominous shift has come a new vocabulary for describing fire and its outcome – and new attention to some of the oldest words in our language.  Continue reading...

The well of drivel will never run dry, so let's amble through the latest and worst euphemisms I've collected during the first month of my second decade as a euphemism columnist.  Continue reading...

These days we need all the levity, lunar or otherwise, that we can get. This lexical lunacy is a flimsy excuse for me to write about my favorite type of word: the reduplication. From ack-ack to zip-zap, reduplicative words are silly, childish, catchy, animalistic, nonsensical, and awesome.  Continue reading...

Out of professional curiosity, I asked first-time author and former Google exec Jessica Powell about how she created the character, company, and place names in her novel The Big Disruption.  Continue reading...

Want to become fluent in the new lingo of blockchain? Here's a brief alphabetical glossary of some of the terms you may encounter.  Continue reading...

Have you ever been a special guest? I like to think all guests are special, but I can't say the same for all words. Please name, blame, and shame the following lexical varmints, which even my rat terrier can't seem to exterminate.  Continue reading...