Word and Language Trivia With Questions and Answers About Interesting and Unsual Words

Language and words are the subject of these trivia questions and answers.

What was the nautical origin of the expression, "not enough room to swing a cat"?
A: The cat referred to was a cat-o'-nine-tails, which was used for lashings at sea.

In the newspaper business, the night staff is known as the lobster shift. What is it known as in mining?
A: The hoot owl.

What is a squab?
A: A young pigeon that has not yet flown.

What is the ylang-ylang?
A: A tree with fragrant flowers widely used in perfume making. The tree is found in southeast Asia; the scent from its blossoms is found in such popular perfumes as Channel No5.  and Arpege.

In the world of computers, what are megaflops?
A: Processing--or operating--speeds of a million floating-points per second. FLOPS is an acronym for floating-point operations per second.

What does the Australian slang word hooroo mean?
A: "Good-bye".

Why is a car's instrument panel called a dashboard?
A: The name dates back to horse-and-buggy days when dashing horses kicked up mud, splashing the passengers riding behind them.  The dashboard was devised to protect hem.

When the bald eagle was first named, what was the meaning of the word bald?
A: White.

What does the word koala mean in Australia's Aborigine language?
A: It means "no drink." This Australian marsupial gets all the liquid it needs from the eucalyptus leaves it eats.

What are the only two words in the English language that contain all the vowels, including "y," in alphabetical order?
A: Facetiously and abstemiously.

What does dingbats mean in Australia?
A: Delirium tremens.

You've no doubt heard the French children's ditty "Alouette." Just what or who is alouette?
A: It's a skylark.

What  is a trilemma?
A: It's similar to a dilemma, but involves three alternatives rather than two.

What does dottle have to do with pipe smoking?
A: It's the caked ash left in the bottom of the bowl after a pipe of tobacco has been  smoked.

What are descriptive word combinations such as brunch, motel and smog called?
A: Portmanteau words.

What is a chiromancer?
A: A palm reader.

How did lb. come to be the abbreviation for a pound?
A: It's the abbreviation for Libra, from the Latin phrase Libra pondo--libra meaning "a unit of measurement," and pondo meaning "by weight."

What does a vexillologist study?
A: Flags.

What is the origin of the popular dog's name Fido?
A: It's from the Latin fidus, meaning "faithful."

What does volvo--the name of the Swedish automaker--mean in English?
A: "I roll"-- the name comes not from Swedish, but from Latin.

What is the occupational origin of the name Walker?
A: In the Middle Ages a walker was someone who cleaned cloth.

What is sneet?
A: In California, where smoke and fog combine to become smog, a downpour of snow and sleet is known as sneet.

What are you afraid of if you have stenophobia.
A: Narrow places.

In hospital slang, what is a GOMER?
A: A patient seeking emergency treatment for a minor complaint. The term is an acronym for Get Out of My Emergency Room.