Terms of Endearment

This morning, while making coffee, I noted my wife’s half-filled cup and asked, “Warm that up for ya, hun?” because that’s what waitresses in American diners say when they give you a refill.

Warm that up for ya’ hun?

This precipitated a brief discussion about how we do not, and never have, used those sorts of monikers for one another. And I’m not even talking about the obnoxious pet-names, like snuggle-bunny, snookums, or smoochie-pie. We don’t even use low-impact endearments, such as “dear...