About 30 years ago, the guy I shared an office with commented about “the strange conversations you people have over the dinner table”. This was, as I recall, occasioned by my mentioning that the previous evening Noreen and I had been ruminating upon the origins, and reasons for, the names animals were given in medieval times. You know: Reynard the Fox, Tib the Cat, Broc the Badger, and so forth.

[Although it has to be said that Jim and I also had some curious conversations in the office; as you do when you are working in IT, you have a doctorate in Chemistry and your office-mate has a doctorate in medieval French, from a French university.]
And indeed Noreen and I do discuss some odd things over dinner. Last evening we wondered about the origin of the word kiosk.
Noreen suspected initially that it might be Arabic. I suggested possibly Hindi; and later wondered about Inuit.
And of course Noreen turns out to be right. Kiosk is indeed derived ultimately from the Persian. According to the OED:

From the French kiosque and Italian chiosco; after the Turkish kiūshk a pavilion; which is from the Persian kūskh, a palace or portico.

Secondarily to this the OED quotes as one of its sources (not the earliest, that’s 1625):

1 April 1717, Lady MW Montagu letter to Mrs Thistlethwayte: “In the public gardens there are public chiosks, where people go and drink their coffee, sherbet, etc.”

I remark on this because the only other time I have come across Thistlethwaite as a name was Prof. Frank Thistlethwaite, Vice-Chancellor of UEA when I was a graduate student there in the early 70s.
But it isn’t just us. A few weeks ago when we met up with our friend Katy (plus under-age hangers on) for lunch the conversation fell to wondering about the origin of hunkey-dorey, meaning OK, good or even excellent. None of us knew, or even wanted to hazard a guess.
But trawling the intertubes it turns out that there is no agreed origin of the expression. The earliest reference seems to be in the US Civil War period collection of songs George Christy’s Essence of Old Kentucky of 1862. Not that this tells us the origin or reason; just when it is first recorded.
Looking further Word Detective turns up another, but suspiciously spurious, possible origin:

Probably the most oft-heard story about “hunky-dory” holds that there was, in the 19th century, a street in Yokohama, Japan, called “Honcho-dori.” It is said that Honcho-dori was the Times Square of Yokohama, and thus a favourite hangout of US sailors on shore leave. So popular did this street become among sailors, it is said, that “Honcho-dori” entered naval slang as “hunky-dory,” a synonym for “Easy Street” or a state of well-being and comfort.
Now, there actually is a “Honcho-dori” in Yokohama. (In fact, there’s one in many Japanese cities, because “Honcho-dori” translates roughly as “Main Street”.) But there are two problems with this story. One is that there is no direct evidence of any connection between the first appearance of “hunky-dory” around 1866 and US sailors in Japan or naval slang in general.
Problem number two is that a connection with “Honcho-dori” is somewhat unnecessary. English already had the archaic American slang word “hunk,” meaning “safe”, from the Dutch word “honk”, meaning goal or home in a game. To achieve “hunk” or “hunky” in a child’s game was to make it “home” and win the game. So “hunky” already meant OK.

But where the dory or dorey came from is, it seems, anyone’s guess. But then maybe it’s just a rhyming duplication like okey-dokey.
Yeah, the strange conversations you people have over dinner!