Air Fungus or Aer Fungus (Aer Lingus nickname)
Aer Lingus is the flag carrier of Ireland. Some people have nicknamed the airline "Aer Fungus" or "Air Fungus." "Air Lingus (EI) - Air Fungus" was posted on the…
Airforce Rejected Me Yesterday (“army” backronym)
"Airforce Rejected Me Yesterday" is a backronym (back acronym) for the word "army." "A.R.M.Y. : Air Force Rejected (me) Yesterday" was cited in print in July 2005.…
Airline Food (Airplane Food)
Airline food (also called "airplane food" or "airline meal" or "in-flight meal") was essentially started by United Airlines in late 1936-early 1937, when food…
Airmageddon (air + Armageddon)
"Airmageddon" (air + Armageddon) can mean several things, such as very bad air pollution. An "airmageddon" at an airport occurs when flights are cancelled (or delayed) and many…
Airmelon (air + melon; jocular formation after “watermelon”)
Watermelon exists, so many people think there should be firemelon, earthmelon and airmelon (water-fire-earth-air + melon), all called the "elemelons" (elements + melons). "The…
Airpocalypse (air + apocalypse)
"Airpocalypse" (air + apocalypse) is a term that was coined in January 2013 to describe China's air pollution problem. The "airpocalypse" term has been used in India and in…
Airport Test (employee selection test)
The "airport test" (also called the "Pittsburgh airport test") is one tool of employee selection. The interviewer asks himself or herself how it would feel being snowed in at…
Airport Test (Pittsburgh Airport Test)
The "airport test" (also called the "Pittsburgh airport test") is one tool of employee selection. The interviewer asks himself or herself how it would feel being snowed in at…
Aisle Hog
Steve Kornacki of Salon.com wrote before the January 2011 State of the Union (SOTU) address, "Meet Congress's 5 biggest aisle hogs: You see them every time a president enters the House to…
Al Dante (al dente + Dante Alighieri)
"Al dente" cooking should not be written as "al Dante" (as in Dante's Inferno), but there are jokes. "How to cook al-dante pasta?" was posted on the newsgroup…
Al-CIAda (Al-Qaeda + CIA)
Al-Qaeda (Arabic for "The Base") is a Sunni Islamic terrorist group founded in 1988-1989 by Osama bin Laden -- with the help of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) -- to fight the…
Al-Reuters or Al Reutzeera (Reuters nickname)
Reuters is an international news agency heaquartered in London. Some Reuters critics have claimed that the news organization has an anti-Western and pro-Muslim bias. This criticism intensified in…
Alain Locke and Harlem Renaissance as the “Big Apple” (1920s; suggested in 1988)
Alain Leroy Locke (1885-1954) was the first African-American Rhodes Scholar and a professor of philosophy at Howard University in Washington, D.C. He guest edited Survey Graphic in March 1925 for a…
Alamo (black cube at Astor Place)
"Alamo" is the name of the big black cube at Astor Place, opposite Cooper Union, in the middle of a traffic island. During a brief repair and cleaning in 2005, and everyone said,…
Albatross (golf score)
Entry in progress -- B.P. Wikipedia: Par (score)AlbatrossAlbatross means scoring three under par (−3) (the albatross being one of the largest birds); also called a double eagle in the U.S. This…
Alexander/Gin Alexander/Brandy Alexander/Coffee Alexander (cocktail)
New York columnist Walter Winchell explained the origin of the Alexander cocktail in his column on March 21, 1929. Rector's (a famous New York eatery before Prohibition) was having a dinner…
Algebro (algebra + bro)
An "algebro" (algebra + bro) is a friend (usually male) who likes math (usually algebra). The term was popularized by the 2008 videogame Math Kickers: Featuring the Algebros. An Urban…
Algonquin Cocktail
The Algonquin Hotel, at 59 West 44th Street in Manhattan, opened in 1902 and has a storied history, although the hotel is not particularly known for its food and drink. The Algonquin cocktail…
Alibi Ike
Entry in progress -- B.P. Wiktionary: Alibi IkeEtymologyFrom the principal character in "Alibi Ike" (1915), a short story by Ring Lardner Sr., and a subsequent film (1935) of the same…
ALICE (Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed)
"ALICE" is a acronym for "Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed." Members of the ALICE class work to earn just enough to get by; anything unexpected -- such as an illness…