Rocking it. Markham Anderson wrote, “Your piece on labradorite [last week] reminded me of my mother-in-law, who was an inveterate rock collector. We often identified rocks for her as leverite, as in, “leave ’er right there!”

Messing up. Following my note on the US regional expression mess and gom last time, Alan Burdick commented that he used the expression gum up the works, to spoil or mess up or interfere with the smooth running of something. He wondered whether gom had turned into gum. The phrase is an elaboration of a US slang term of the early twentieth century, to gum or gum up. The Oxford English Dictionary puts it under gum, the glue or sticky stuff, which is the more likely semantic route.

David Means remembers gum up the works being used by relatives in Oklahoma 60 years ago, as well as a related version, it’s all gommed up: “My understanding was that both phrases implied that something thick and sticky had gotten into delicate machinery, although it had many more applications than that literal sense.”

I was unable to explain why mess and gom was used to refer to a meal, though it turns out that I was right to suggest an association with mess in the sense of a portion of food (it’s the same word as mess for a place to eat, as in officers’ mess). Judy Mincey wrote, “Mr Denson's wife’s aunt used the phrase to mean eating up all the leftovers. Mess is used in the sense of a mess of greens and gom in the sense of gobble up. As a native Georgian, I have heard this all my life, though it is uncommon now. My grandmother, a native of Pickens County in north Georgia, used it.” Robin Wilkinson added: “Gom is in current use by my mother, born 1916 in NE Texas. I might ask ‘Shall I add a scarf to this outfit?’ Her reply would be ‘No don't gom it up.’ Rather than just disorder, I have always associated gom with a collection of unrelated items, as in various toys and hobbies left out in the living room. To mess and gom would be to eat a collection of unrelated leftovers for dinner.”