Erin McKean

A love letter is to be savored; a love email... is to be forwarded to all your friends, and probably laughed at. ”

Words are so lovable. How could you not love words? ”

If you say 'anti-aging,' how anti would it have to be, really? My guess is not much. Any amount of sunscreen could be considered anti-aging. ”

Aging' has been bad ever since we figured out it led to dying. ”

All words have life cycles. ”

Almost any word can be drafted to serve as a verb, even words we think of as eternal and unchanging, stuck in their more traditional roles. ”

The use of food metaphors is really well established English... Somebody is a peach, a hot tamale. ”

Part of the joy and pleasure of English is its boundless creativity: I can describe a new machine as bicyclish, I can say that I'm vitamining myself to stave off a cold, I can complain that someone is the smilingest person I've ever seen, and I can decide, out of the blue, that 'fetch' is now the word I want to use to mean 'cool.' ”

For me, conferences are like little mental vacations: a chance to go visit an interesting place for a couple of days, and come back rested and refreshed with new ideas and perspectives. ”

By the time the traditionally male lexicographers become interested in looking at fashion words, their origins are lost in the mists of time. ”