IKEA, the name of the worldwide home furnishings emporium, is an acronym. The founder was Ingvar Kamprad, accounting for the first two letters. And his family farm in Sweden was called Elmtaryd, hard by the village of Agunnaryd, providing the last two.

Was there really a Johnny Appleseed?

There's sometimes a thin line between mythology and pathology. How would YOU characterize a guy today who walked barefoot from town to town, wearing a tin pot on his head, dressed in strange clothes, preaching and planting trees? You would probably call the cops and have this nut put away.

Well, John Chapman (1774-1845), aka "Johnny Appleseed," was neither pathological nor mythological. He probably didn't go barefoot, as he is sometimes depicted, and while he may have smoked pot or whatever was the equivalent in those days, he didn't wear one. He did preach and plant orchards in the Midwest, although not simply by scattering seeds from a sack. In fact, by the time he died he was pretty well off, owning lots of land and many orchards.

Why does the phrase to go 'the whole nine yards' mean to carry some act to full completion, with a sense that it is accomplished without stopping and at full speed?

It may seem like the phrase has something to do with team sports. Do the nine yards represent distance won or lost on a football field? Although the expression is popular among sports fans, the origin lies elsewhere.

One theory says the expression came from the cement delivery industry, where a rotating mixer truck carries nine cubic yards of cement. To discharge the whole nine yards would be to fully complete the task.

Another theory describes the space between the inner and outer walls of a prison, which was nine yards wide. To go the whole nine yards was to escape entirely.

What exactly is "kangaroo court"?

A kangaroo court is a mock or illegal court that is set up in violation of established legal procedure, or it is one that is characterized by dishonesty or incompetence.

You might expect that this term originated in Australia, the land of kangaroos, but it seems to be of American origin. It first appeared in the early 1850s in the far western US. It may have originated during the California Gold Rush, possibly in connection with Australian prospectors, many of whom arrived during that time.

Why do we say that something that's silly is, well, "silly?"

Oh, how the mighty have fallen! At one time, if you were silly it meant that you were blessed. Now, I have to tell you that I am one of those free spirits who still thinks it is blessed to be silly, but I would never claim that it was also silly to be blessed.

Silly began as the Old English word, "saelig," which described a happy state of affairs. In fact, if you were unhappy, you were unsaelig. As English evolved, the word became seely - sounds like it passed through Latin America, doesn't it? - and eventually, silly. But that wasn't the only thing that changed. Gradually it came to mean innocent. Then "silly" really fell on hard times and described someone who was pitiful. After that, it was strictly etymological misfortune as it spiraled down into ignorant, weak and foolish.

Why do we say "goody two-shoes"?

A goody two-shoes is a smugly self-righteous person who makes a big show about being good and virtuous while secretly hiding less benevolent motivations.

Originally, a goody two-shoes was simply someone who went around parading his or her goodness, which may have been annoying but not necessarily hypocritical. It was not until the 1930s that the phrase
took on a negative tone.

~ Knock on Wood ~

In Britain, the phrase is "touch wood," but the meaning is the same. It's said (while performing the act, of course) as a way of warding off evil influences.

There are several interesting theories about the origin of this ancient ritual. The most commonly accepted explanation goes back to pre-Christian times, when Pagans believed in the protective powers of the spirits of certain trees, notably oak, ash, or holly. Bytouching the tree, one was said to awaken the benevolent spirit within.

Another theory that may ultimately come from the same source involves the extremely ancient children's game of tag, where one who is touching a tree is safe from capture.

When the atom bomb was being built in New Mexico during World War II, the government hired only illiterates as janitors so they wouldn't be able to pick up secrets from the trash.

Does the planet Vulcan in Star Trek have any basis in reality?

Spock, shmock. Just because Peter Pan believed in Never- Never Land, do you think you would earn frequent flier miles by booking a flight to it? Everyone knows that
the planet Vulcan was a product of Star Trek creator Gene Rodenberry's imagination.

Well, not entirely. Vulcan was not only the Roman god of fire, but also a planet that astronomers once conjured up to explain Mercury's peculiar orbit.

Mercury's path didn't fully compute. So in the mid-19th century, astronomers bet there was a yet unobserved planet between Mercury and the Sun, the gravitational
pull of which was responsible for Mercury's perturbing path.

Why is someone who's indecisive "waffling?"

Picture a waffle. Lots of little squares that are ideal for holding syrup, right? So, what do you conclude about the relationship between this breakfast food's
shape and being indecisive?

Nothing, I hope, because there isn't any relationship. The relationship is between waffle and the Old English word, "wafian," which meant "to wave." From that word
in the 16th century came another, "whiffle," which described the wind when it changed direction. (Perhaps someone had a lisp and said what sounded like "the wind is whiffling.") Now jump to the 1950s and 60s and whiffle ball, a game in which you hit a wind-blown plastic ball with holes in it. That ball, like indecisive people, could go in any direction.

So, why don't we say that indecisive people whiffle, instead of waffle? Maybe someone talked with his or her mouth full. I'm not sure, can't decide.

Why do we refer to someone who's lazy as lackadaisical?

Maybe we're just looking for trouble. People get punched in the snoot for such name-calling.

But if we insist on doing it, we should know that the word originates
in a medieval expression, "alack-a-day," meaning "shame on this day." It had the implication of ruing the day because of the ill fortune
it brought you. Over the years, though, it was watered down and used for trifling misfortunes and finally, for getting sentimental over things that didn't rate such feeling. Someone who habitually whined and went on about such piffle became a "lackadaisy" and was
characterized as lackadaisical. Finally, it applied to languid people who had the energy to do only that and nothing substantive in life.

The year 1666 was much feared throughout Western Europe because of its triple sixes, “666,” which represent the "Number of the Beast."

Corrected: Why do we respond to something dumb or obvious with "duh/doh?"

The interjection doh, indicating that you have done or said something stupid (as opposed to the duh indicating that someone else has said something obvious), gets its recent popular incarnation from Homer Simpson (voiced by actor Dan Castellanata) on the animated TV series The Simpsons.

Castellaneta and The Simpson's creator Matt Groening have stated that they came up with the expression in imitation of actor James Finlayson. Finlayson was a sidekick of Laurel and Hardy and used the expression "do-o-o-o-h" as early as 1931 in Laurel and Hardy films and shorts. Finlayson used the interjection as a euphemism for damn. Others used the interjection in the intervening years. Castellanata was not the first since Finlayson, although he did clip Finlayson's pronunciation and formed the contemporary, short pronunciation.

Peanuts are one of the ingredients of dynamite.

There are more chickens than people in the world.

All of the clocks in the movie "Pulp Fiction" are stuck on 4:20.

No word in the English language rhymes with month, orange, silver, or purple.

"Dreamt" is the only English word that ends in the letters "mt".

Winston Churchill was born in a ladies' room during a dance.

There are only four words in the Englishlanguage which end in "dous":tremendous,horrendous, stupendous, and hazardous.

An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.

Tigers have striped skin, not just striped fur.

In most advertisements, the time displayed on a watch is 10:10.

Al Capone's business card said he was aused furniture dealer.

The characters Bert and Ernie on Sesame Street were named after Bert the cop and Ernie the taxi driver in Frank Capra's " It's a Wonderful Life."

A dragonfly has a life span of 24 hours.

A goldfish has a memory span of three seconds.

A dime has 118 ridges around the edge.

It's impossible to sneeze with your eyes open.

The giant squid has the largest eyes in the world.

In England, the Speaker of the House is not allowed to speak.

The microwave was invented after a researcher walked by a radar tube and a chocolate bar melted in his pocket.

Mr. Rogers is an ordained minister.

The average person falls asleep in seven minutes.

Why do we graduate from college with a "bachelor's" degree?

Judging from what we read in the paper these days, many people are graduating from college with, first, a pretty big bar tab. It'amazing that they can walk steadily enough across the stage at graduation to be handed anything but a summons.

As for the bachelor's degree, when I was a kid I thought it was related to coming of age. Would you call an unmarried 11-year-old a "bachelor?" But there's a more formal explanation. It was only in the 14th century that the word was applied to college graduates and unmarried persons. It originated a century earlier as a description of a young knight or aspiring knight – thus a soldier low in the military hierarchy. So, a college graduate as "bachelor" would be earning his or her spurs academically, but only at the lowest rank in
academia.