I don’t want to think how long ago, but I remember it like yesterday. I was talking to a neighbor in my Santa Monica apartment building (948 14th Street) and he was recalling a story about a woman he knew being “out to lunch” and I immediately said “literally or figuratively?” And I remember feeling pleased when he chuckled at that. And this morning it suddenly hit me that I haven’t heard “out to lunch” used in that context for a long, long time. And that it might be one of those expressions that have just slipped into the ether, never to return. The language does this. New expressions arrive like babies every day, and for the language to breathe and thrive certain expressions have to die to make room. Another one I haven’t heard in a dog’s age is “the lights are on but nobody’s home.” But you can’t fight natural selection. The language has to make way for new stuff like nature’s boner, peefurbished, motorfloating, birth vegan and wash the cat.