
What's the difference between “bucket” and “pail”?
Pail, sad to say, is utterly lacking in this regard. EDIT: Taking a look through Google's N-Gram viewer, it's not hard to see why: This comparison of bucket and pail from 1800 till today shows the latter's usage diverging noticeably from the former's around the era of 1940–1960, to becoming a much less popular a synonym for the former ...
What is the origin of the phrase "beyond the pale"?
Dec 6, 2010 · From World Wide Words:. Pale is an old name for a pointed piece of wood driven into the ground and — by an obvious extension — to a barrier made of such stakes, a palisade or fence.
What is the origin of "Robbing Peter to pay Paul"?
Aug 27, 2011 · The origin comes from the Peter tax and the Paul tax:. The expression refers to times before the Reformation when Church taxes had to be paid to St. Paul's church in London and to St. Peter's church in Rome; originally it referred to neglecting the Peter tax in order to have money to pay the Paul tax.
If my boat is sinking should I bale or bail the water out?
Oct 6, 2018 · From various literary examples it appears that I should manually 'bail' out the water to keep afloat but the automated water removal system in my vessel is a 'baling pump'.
word choice - What are these containers called for waste?
Dec 22, 2019 · When I was a kid in the 1960s we had both a trash can and a garbage pail, because, I think, the city collected them separately. Rubbish is mostly a British term. (I now live in a city where there are separate collections for trash, recyclables, food scraps for compost, and yard waste, but most American cities are doing well to separate trash ...
etymology - Origin of "tail over teakettle"? - English Language
Jul 21, 2014 · According to The Phrase Finder, it is a variation of ass end over teakettle and actually Ngran shows that its usage started a few years later.
The "wrought /wreaked havoc" misunderstanding
Feb 7, 2016 · Here's an Ngram chart that tracks the frequency in Google Books search results of "wrought havoc" (blue line) versus "wreaked havoc" versus "worked havoc" (green line) for the period 1800–2005:
What does it mean to call someone a 'drink of water'?
Aug 23, 2015 · Meaning (of "long drink of water") is ambiguous, just generally meaning "tall", as reflected in answers here, though specific use can have connotations of "tall and attractive (man/woman)" or "lanky, gangly" (tall and awkward).
Is there a word to describe indecisiveness between two things?
The ass in question is a donkey that is equally thirsty and hungry, finds itself midway between a stack of hay and a pail of water, and, unable to make its mind up, dies of hunger and thirst. The paradox is named after the 14th century French philosopher Jean Buridan , whose philosophy of moral determinism it satirizes.
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Mar 5, 2025 · Never used diaper pail (Remington) $50 Posted by: Sale 3972150502 Wed Mar 05 2025 9:08 pm: 1992 VW Eurovan ...
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