SUMMARY

More and more college students are getting pregnant--with burrito babies. Grant talks about new terms for "a full stomach" and other examples of campus slang. Also, is it safe to play on the macadam? Also, overegging the pudding, what it means to be gobsmacked, the difference between who and whom, apostrophe placement, how to pronounce coup de grace, and the embarrassing results when a smartphone mistakenly autocorrects text messages.

FULL DETAILS

Remember the classic children's story "Where the Wild Thongs Are"? (We didn't think so.) That's just one of the autocorrect horror stories that can happen when smartphones mistakenly correct a text message. Martha and Grant discuss several more.

http://damnyouautocorrect.com/

If someone is gobsmacked, they're totally surprised. The term may come from the same Gaelic root that gave us the Everlasting Gobstopper.

http://taoism.about.com/b/2008/12/29/everlasting-gobstopper.htm

Should the sign on the boys' bathroom at a school read Boy's Room or Boys' Room? The hosts clarify where to put the apostrophe.

"A fifth-year senior"? That term is so 2007. These days, college students just refer to that extra year of school as taking a victory lap. Grant shares this and other examples of campus slang collected by University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill professor Connie Eble.

Our Quiz Guy John Chaneski has a game of demonyms. What do you call someone from a certain place? If you're from Cambridge, for example, you're a Cantabrigian.

If someone has overegged the pudding, they've overstated the case. This may explain why a lawyer from Lawrence, Kansas, found the phrase in a judicial opinion.

A motivational Chinese idiom translates as "ride the cow, look for the horse."

Are the names Aaron and Erin pronounced the same? A bicoastal listener insists they should sound different. A longer discussion about Erin vs. Aaron is on the Straight Dope message board.

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/archive/index.php/t-133780.html

The word sic, meaning "thus" in Latin, is placed in the text when an author knowingly quotes a misspelled word or otherwise incorrect statement.

A native of Southern Pennsylvania has always used the term macadam in place of asphalt. Martha traces the word from an old gravel road to the modern day tarmac.

A Japanese idiom, referring to someone who takes credit for another's work, translates as "doing sumo in someone else's underwear."

If you say, "The worm has turned," it means you've lost patience. Grant and Martha explain that this expression goes back to the old proverb "Tread on a worm and it will turn."

More and more college students are getting pregnant with burrito babies. Grant explains that that this slang term simply means that someone's stomach is full from a hefty meal.

What is the proper use of the French term coup de grace? Grant and Martha explain how the term has been twisted, both in pronunciation and meaning.

How can you tell the difference between who and whom? A listener shares a chant learned in grade school to remember the proper usage.

Grant shares a bit of military humor related to cumshaw, the art of procuring what you need in ingenious ways: "There is only one thief in the army. Everyone else is just trying to get their stuff back."

You know the feeling when something hurts so good? A massage therapist looks for a term that describes this mix of pleasure and anguish. Sensanguish? Hedonalgia, maybe?

Grant shares Tom Swifties sent in by listeners: "Aw, shucks, I dropped the toothpaste," Tom said crestfallenly, and "I've located the experts," Tom said profoundly.

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