Pink Slip - 11 April 2016

<p>This week on "A Way with Words": The language of political speech. Politicians have to repeat themselves so often that they naturally develop a repertoire of stock phrases to fall back on. But is there any special meaning to subtler locutions, such as beginning a sentence with the words "Now, look…"? Also, a peculiar twist in Southern speech may leave outsiders scratching their heads: In parts of the South "I wouldn't care to" actually means "I would indeed like to." Finally, how the word "nerd" went from a dismissive term to a badge of honor. Also, dog in the manger, crumb crushers, hairy panic, pink slips, make a branch, and horning hour.<br /><br />FULL DETAILS<br /><br />A listener in Weathersfield, Vermont, remembers going on car trips as a young child and wondering why, toward the end of the day, her parents would be on the lookout for motels with bacon seed.<br /><br />Someone who is likened to a dog in the manger is acting spitefully, claiming something they don't even need or want in order to prevent others from having it. The story that inspired this phrase goes all the way back to ancient Greece.<br /><br />A Denton, Texas, caller wonders: Are politicians increasingly starting sentences with the phrase Now, look . . . ?<br /><br />A listener in Ellsworth, Michigan, shares a favorite simile from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams: The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't.<br /><br />Make a branch is a euphemism that means "to urinate," the word branch being a dialectal term for "a small stream."<br /><br />Quiz Guy John Chaneski puts on his toque and serves up a quiz about kitchen spices. <br /><br />A San Antonio, Texas, listener is puzzled about a story in The Guardian about Mavis Staples speculating about her romance with Bob Dylan: "If we’d had some little plum-crushers, how our lives would be. The kids would be singing now, and Bobby and I would be holding each other up." Plum-crushers? Chances are, though, that the reporter misheard a different slang t