Take My Name
A French physician lent his name to this execution device he'd hoped would prove more humane.
What is guillotine?
(Named after French physician and politician Dr. Joseph-Ignace Guillotin; actually designed by French surgeon Antoine Louis and German engineer Tobias Schmidt)
Snapchat invented this feature that, within a few years, Instagram, Facebook, and even LinkedIn had shamelessly cloned.
What are stories?
These marine mammals hold paws while they sleep so the current doesn't drift them apart.
What is sea otter?
Tony Soprano's very first panic attack is triggered not by a rival mobster but by a family of these abandoning his backyard pool.
The neurologists stole this medication from us for migraine prophylaxis, but their doses are still usually rookie numbers next to ours.
What is amitriptyline?
In Norse mythology, warriors who fall in glorious combat are airlifted to this fabled hall, a place we are all too familiar with.
What is Valhalla?
A German engineer's surname now means both this heavy fuel and the engine that burns it.
What is diesel?
Named after German mechanical engineer, Rudolf Diesel)
Biologist Richard Dawkins coined this word in his 1976 book The Selfish Gene for an idea that spreads and mutates — decades before it meant a captioned cat photo.
What is meme?
Thanks to a unique figure-eight wingbeat, this is the only bird that can fly backwards.
What is hummingbird?
Bradley Cooper's relentlessly upbeat ex-teacher in Silver Linings Playbook spends the movie learning to manage this psychiatric disorder.
What is bipolar disorder?
This medication, FDA-approved in December 1992, has even been floated in court as a defense for things people don't remember doing.
What is zolpidem?
A former president and his senator wife traded D.C. for this quiet, fun-to-pronounce hamlet. We might also find another, all-too-familiar figure here.
What is Chappaqua?
This towering fairground ride is named for G.W.G., the bridge engineer who debuted it at an 1893 Chicago fair.
What is Ferris wheel?
(Named after structural engineer George Washington Gale Ferris, Jr.)
Long before it meant your little profile picture, this word from Hindu theology described a deity descending to Earth in bodily form.
What is avatar?
This Australian marsupial has fingerprints so humanlike they could theoretically muddle a crime scene.
What is koala?
After landing in a 1960s psychiatric ward, Winona Ryder's character in Girl, Interrupted is saddled with this diagnosis.
What is borderline personality disorder?
If I got a nickel for every song named after this shakes-and-trots-inducing medication, I'd have two nickels — one from Nirvana, one from Evanescence. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird it happened twice.
What is lithium?
Linger a while in this riverside village whose name itself suggests dawdling; it anchors the west end of the Tappan Zee Bridge.
What is Tarrytown?
This genus of food-poisoning bacteria is named for an American veterinarian named Daniel — not for the fish everyone blames.
What is Salmonella?
Instagram bolted on this short, vertical, music-backed video feature in a fairly transparent bid to clone TikTok.
What are reels?
The female of this deep-sea predator dangles a glowing lure, while the much tinier male permanently fuses to her body.
What is anglerfish?
A haunted little boy delivers this chilling four-word confession to his Philadelphia child psychologist — who really ought to check his own pulse.
What is "I see dead people?"
Christened to mimic a calming neurotransmitter, this medication then snubs every last one of that receptor's docks.
What is gabapentin?
This county seat pairs a color with flat, open fields; Washington fought a 1776 battle on its ground.
What is White Plains?
A daring French acrobat named Jules gave his name to this skin-tight one-piece.
A sanctuary for fandoms and moody aesthetics, this microblog torched its own traffic overnight with a 2018 ban on adult content.
Tumblr
The "water bear," or tardigrade, famously survived ten days of direct exposure to this lethal environment in 2007.
What is outer space?
The 2024 Joker sequel lifts its subtitle straight from this term for a type of delusion.
What is folie à deux?
This benzo lost the popularity contest to lorazepam in every category except its FDA blessing for insomnia — you may call it the Temu lorazepam.
What is temazepam?
The phrase "up the river" comes from convicts sent up the Hudson from Manhattan to a maximum-security prison in this village.
What is Ossining?
This word for a fiercely independent thinker, who acts differently from the crowd, comes from a Texas rancher who refused to brand his cattle.
What is maverick?
(Named after Samuel A. Maverick (1803–1870), a Texas lawyer and cattleman)
This perpetually surprised Shiba Inu became one of the internet's best-loved memes, later lending its face to a joke cryptocurrency.
What is Doge?
By sheer human body count per year, this is the deadliest animal alive.
What is mosquito?
A prescription-amphetamine spiral drives Ellen Burstyn's Sara Goldfarb into psychosis and, by the grim finale of Requiem for a Dream, into being treated with this.
What is ECT?
Take this medication, bolt it onto a little Wellbutrin, and watch pharma sell it right back to you as a weight-loss pill.
What is naltrexone?
Pepsi and Mastercard both keep their headquarters in this aptly-named town, whose name is also an action you might do at a store.
What is Purchase?
This vivid pinkish-purple, and its oddly-spelled flowering shrub, is named after 16th-century German botanist Leonhart.
What is fuchsia?
(Named after 16th-century German physician and botanist Leonhart Fuchs)
On Twitter/X, getting this means your post drew far more replies than likes — a public sign the internet thinks you're wrong.
What is ratio?
A group of these slinky, domesticated animals, whose name starts with an "F" and doubles as a verb meaning "search about," is called a "business."
What are ferrets?
Hitchcock's Psycho grinds to a halt so a psychiatrist can over-explain how Norman Bates may have this Freudian complex.
What is Oedipus complex?
This rapid-acting antidepressant is essentially cough-syrup, paired with bupropion to stop your liver from shredding it.
What is Auvelity?
With its name composed of a synonym for "glimpse" plus a synonym for "talent," this city sits on its own bay of the Hudson.
What is Peekskill?