readme:

One question: am I really supposed to mow the lawn in February? It certainly seems to be growing. And when I took the dogs out yesterday, I was absent-mindedly brushing away a fly circling me for a full minute before I realized that a fly was circling me. That ain’t right. I’ve also just realized that my computer is operating, for some unknown reason, with a UK dictionary and wants me to spell “realized” as “realised.” I must fix this, as I have lost a big chunk of my formerly crackerjack spelling ability

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Dear Word Detective: What is the derivation of “in the pink”? My father, born an Englishman, claims that the color of the jackets of those who hunt fox on horseback with their hounds (never “dogs,” if you please) is called “pink,” not “red,” in the hunting jargon, and supposes that to be “in the pink” is to be in fine hunting form. One is inclined not to doubt one’s own father of course. But it does seem sensible to “trust, but verify” in such matters. — Leslie R. Weatherhead.

Yes it does. Parents and other trusted

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Dear Word Detective: Most people know that the word “anniversary” deals with years, due to its root word, “annum.” But I constantly hear people talk about a six-week “anniversary” or a seven-month “anniversary.” These phrases are incorrect, but I cannot come up with a word that works in that instance. Certainly using fractions of a year (“our 3/10s anniversary”) is ridiculous, so what is the correct word, or words? — Gary R.

Good question. I was going to wait until the first anniversary of its arrival in my inbox before answering it, but we’ll just call this

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Dear Word Detective: Can you tell me why the word “bespoke” has become so popular recently? Did a movie actor or rock celeb re-coin the term? — Stuart Rosenberg.

Not that I know of, but what do I know? I seem to have a serious celebrity/showbiz/tabloid news deficiency. I didn’t know who Casey Anthony was until last month, and if Beyonce has a last name, it’s news to me. In fact, until the Anthony business, I had only a hazy idea of who Nancy Grace is, and I certainly didn’t realize that she’s

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Dear Word Detective: Do you know where the term “whostruckjohn,” meaning, to me, a little white lie (as in “I caught a 12 foot fish.” “Aw, you’re just giving me a whostruckjohn”) came from? I have also heard it used in the sense of “a mess,” as in “It looks like whostruckjohn in here.” It seems to be local to the Washington DC/Baltimore area. There was a local Baltimore rock band called Who Struck John, and there is a jazz composition by some famous jazz artist (sorry I can’t recall who, right now) called Who Struck John;

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Dear Word Detective: Is there not a phrase “coming out in droves” or do I have “droves” wrong? And if “droves” is indeed correct, what does it mean? — Ron Burkey, Jr.

Ah, the sound of a man doubting his own sanity. I know it well. Every so often I’ll find myself typing or saying something that makes perfect sense to me, but which fails, for some reason, to mean anything useful on Planet Earth. A few years ago I convinced myself that I had grown up using the word “stinch,” meaning “to be stingy.” No

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Dear Word Detective: I’m reading “Five Weeks in a Balloon” by Jules Verne. A character is described as “the jester and merry-andrew of the boatswain’s mess.” I understand what a “merry-andrew” is, but can’t find out where it came from. Please help. — Jan.

I’ve never read “Five Weeks in a Balloon,” though I probably should have during my Jules Verne phase (roughly when I was between 12 and 14). I must admit that the title has always made me a bit uneasy. I’m not claustrophobic at all, but I am acrophobic,

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Dear Word Detective: I recently found “sabe” on the Scrabble word list. I wondered what it meant, but could only find it in the Merriam-Webster Scrabble Players Dictionary as a verb meaning “to savvy.” I know “savvy” is related to the Spanish “sabe,” but have been unable to find any English use of the word. Is it an English word? If not, any idea how it ended up on the word list?

Rats. I was getting all fired up for my anti-Scrabble rant, which I trot out every two or

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Dear Word Detective: My mother says that there was a comic book character that originated the contraction of “would rather” into “druthers.” Other folks call it a Southernism. Where’d it really come from? — Debbie.

Comic book? Southernism? How strange. I always assumed that it came from Druthers, our family butler when I was growing up. Druthers was a good man, but he never seemed to be there when you needed him, not a winning trait in a butler. I distinctly remember Father saying, nearly every day, “If I had my Druthers, I would drive to

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Dear Word Detective: I heard someone say that the term “money laundering” originated with Mafia ownership of laundromats in the United States. I think the speaker was clearly hitting the suds that day. Do you know when and how the term “money laundering” came to be? — Chris.

Oh boy, a Mafia question. Always fun. Back in the 1990s, I wrote a weekly column for the New York Daily News called “City Slang,” in which I answered readers’ questions about the rich and varied vernacular of the city. Since the Mob is a popular obsession in NYC,

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Dear Word Detective: I’ve lived most of my life in the southern US, and for most of that time I’ve heard about “bar ditches” beside the road. It has been explained to me that the name refers to the fact that the dirt that makes the “crown” in the center of the road was “bar-aahd” from the ditches. I have been unimpressed by this explanation for forty-five or fifty years now. Any suggestions? — Stewart Bolerjack.

Hey, we live on a road like that, with no shoulder and deep ditches on both sides. You do not wanna end

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Dear Word Detective: Please explain the origin of the phrase “The world is your oyster” with regards to having the ability to accomplish anything you put your mind to. And is this a correct paraphrase? — Julie.

You’re close, but in place of “ability,” I’d say “opportunity,” and rather than “accomplish anything you put your mind to,” I’d go with “profit from your position.” The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) explains the idiom “the world is one’s oyster” as meaning that “one is in a position to profit from the opportunities that life, or a particular situation,

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