I recently downloaded a great new iPhone application — Word Warp. (AND it’s free!) It’s a game that gives you six letters and you try to find as many words as possible. I now play it whenever I’m on the T.
The other day, “LAM” came up as one of my words. And that got me thinking.
Do you ever use the word “lam” without the words “on the” preceding it?
I couldn’t think of any instance. Neither could my sister and her friend.
It’s something to think about…
The Grammar Vandal 
I’ve definitely got to find a way to work ‘lamming’ or ‘lamnation’ into a conversation, one day very soon!
I would be more likely to say “mal” from that.
I don’t, but “off the lam” is an obvious alternative which actually gets valid hits on Google…
Hmm. I don’t use it often, but I don’t use the hoosegow, pokey, or manacles often, either. (In either sense.) The lam in “on the lam” just means ‘run’ or ‘hurry’. It’s both a verb and a noun, like run. You can use it in phrases like “lam out of here” or even “he could really lam”. It just happens to be one of the many words that exist almost exclusively in criminal-speak. Most of us don’t use the noun ‘make’ in the sense of ‘process of hoodwinking’, either, so we only hear it in the phrase “on the make”.
Incidentally, a lam is also a piece in a loom. I think this is an unrelated word, but maybe not.
Lamb. Hah.
I’ve almost never the word, “lo” used alone, even though I know it can be. It’s almost always followed by, “and behold”.