Frazz by Jef Mallett for February 22, 2020

Those words can’t be printed here.

The test will be, if they say the word, will you know that it’s “pothole”?

How much wood can a woodchuck chuck into a chuckhole if a woodchuck could chuck wood?

English is saddled with a plastic vocabulary. I’d speak French if it weren’t for the people. Then we’d have just one word for the tree lawns, sodas, root beer floats, etc. ; and read something funny in the comics.

English often has two (at least) correct words for the same thing, one from Anglo-Saxon, and one Latinate (usually directly from French). After the Norman Conquest, both languages were spoken in Britain, and then they merged,

I think Frazz is referring to the variety of Anglo-Saxon incantations that can appear at almost every frustrating moment of one’s life. Not polite, but brings comfort to the soul.

Forget pot/chuck holes. One winter on 1-35 From Overland Park KS to down town KC, winter freeze/spring warm temps caused many huge gaps in concrete that broke axels & worse. My use of I-35 was closer to KC MOwhen I got on at Antioch in Merriam KS, so I missed the wrecks.

One has a bunch of wood in it. The other is in the street.

I’d never heard the term “chuckhole” before yesterday, and I’ve spent my entire life in Wisconsin, where — yes, indeed — we certainly do know from potholes.

Most of those are modifiers.

My Dad always called them chugholes. regional differences I suppose.

Mallett Blog Posts Frazz18 hrs · If you assume a vocabulary is a finite thing, that a brain or culture has the capacity for only so many words, what do you suppose people who live in the South do with all the words they don’t have to use describing or casting evil spells upon pits in the pavement excavated by the freeze-thaw cycle?

Chuckhole is an old farmers term. From the holes woodchucks would dig in farm fields. Dangerous to livestock.

Pittsburgh Potholes are STILL the winner! https://i.imgur.com/UwdjkE5.jpg