Middle-school English teacher. Former dictionary editor and spokesperson. I write about etymology at mashedradish.com.
John Kelly
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TIL the I in BIH is 'i,' meaning "and" in Serbo-Croatian languages. So, Bosna i Hercegovina (Bosnia and Herzegovina): BIH. That Slavic 'i' is reconstructed in a little Proto-Indo-European pronoun that evolved into a variety of function words.
Also apt? SPURN is related to SPUR.
My latest blog post was brought to you by a killer (and timely) pun from Shakespeare's 'Comedy of Errors':
Am I so round with you as you with me,
That like a football you do spurn me thus?
This. I mainly just like to form sick words when I play Scrabble.
I write a blog on etymology, have been for 13 years. I usually draw my topics from news. No Substack. No video. No monetization. Strictly no AI. I pay to keep it ad-free. Visit? Get the content—no hoops. You can subscribe, but I'm not in your face about it. Just a guy doin' a thing: mashedradish.com
Similarly, I only occasionally ever do the NYT Spelling Bee. When I do, only at the bottom of the Morning newsletter, I just like to solve the pangram and bail.
I used to run a dictionary. You'd think I'd love word games more. I really just like sick words.
Rollins and Hawkins in the last minute of 'Lover Man' on their 1963 'Sonny Meets Hawk!' My God.
Great art grabs you—and doesn't let you go. Their playing here leaves me breathless, my heart quickened, every time.
