“[It’s] surprising how many different names Americans have for that strip of ground between the sidewalk and the street: ‘boulevard,’ ‘grass plot,’ ‘parkway’ and ‘tree bank’ are among them. So after a child abductor in the ’90s left a note demanding that ransom be deposited in a trash can ‘on the devil strip’ at an intersection, a forensic linguist used this dictionary to help solve the crime.”