OK, finally I'll try to get into the spirit of this thread. When my son was small, he watched Sesame Street, and he was impressed by Bert's paper clip collection. He couldn't pronounce "paper clip collection"--it came out "paper cliption." Also, he wasn't clear on the distinction between the collection and the individual paper clips. So the whole family adopted "paper cliption" as the term for paper clip.

The clerk at the local liquor store used to give my son a lollipop whenever he accompanied us there. So we started calling the liquor store "the lollipop shop." At least my son always understood where we were going!

Around Minnesota, we have a few pet names for our local institutions. Target Stores, which began here and have their headquarters here, is frequently given a fake French pronunciation: Tar-zhay. It sounds so much more upscale to say you bought something at Tarzhay.

The Minnesota Twins are called the Twinks when they're not doing well. Likewise, the Vikings are sometimes called the Vi-queens. The Star-Tribune is often called the Strib. Heileman's Special Export, a brand of beer that comes in a green bottle, and seems to be a little stronger than other beers, has long been called "Green Death." I don't know why it's the only brand of beer that has an unofficial nickname. The company has been trying to get us to call it Special Ex.

My college roommate was a strict Baptist who never swore. But he loved saying, "Got dandruff! Some of it itches!" or "Cheese and crackers got all muddy!"