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Post by Trevor on Apr 4, 2018 10:41:35 GMT
I guess April snuck up on us as it's reached the fourth and no-one has started a thread.
So, here's a thread.
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Post by Verbivore on Apr 4, 2018 11:46:02 GMT
Thanks, Trevor!
As I live in a time zone ahead of most here I often start a new month's thread, but I didn’t want to hog them all. Was just waiting for some other April fool. :-)
Anyhow, I've been busy emptying the hard drive in my head onto paper: my memoirs are now up to 140,000 words, and climbing. I shouldn't be surprised if they reach 200,000 before the exercise is over – if ever.
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Post by Little Jack Horner on Apr 7, 2018 16:23:28 GMT
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Post by Dave Miller on Apr 8, 2018 4:45:47 GMT
That link didn't work for me, ljh - but this one does: nordic.businessinsider.com/how-to-properly-use-semicolon-2018-4Quite interesting ... until they say the semicolon should never be followed by “and”, when they’ve just given an example (listing the Beatles and their roles) of how to use it that DOES follow it with “and”!
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Post by Geoff on Apr 8, 2018 5:17:36 GMT
I guess April snuck up on us as it's reached the fourth and no-one has started a thread. Trevor, you afford me the opportunity to ask, is it snuck or sneaked? I keep yelling at my TV that there is no such word as snuck and that it should be sneaked, in spite of how common the use of snuck is. Dos anyone else have an opinion? PS. I note that snuck is underlined in red as I write this post.
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Post by Dave Miller on Apr 8, 2018 8:45:34 GMT
I think that snuck was not formally a part of British English, but has such a quirky element of fun about it that it has now stuck. (Rather than sticked!)
A similar “fun” participle might be squoze, which I often use as an informal variant of squeezed.
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Post by Little Jack Horner on Apr 8, 2018 9:43:07 GMT
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Post by Trevor on Apr 8, 2018 17:13:29 GMT
I guess April snuck up on us as it's reached the fourth and no-one has started a thread. Trevor, you afford me the opportunity to ask, is it snuck or sneaked? I keep yelling at my TV that there is no such word as snuck and that it should be sneaked, in spite of how common the use of snuck is. I wondered if someone might pick that up, Geoff. I can't recall where, but I do remember it coming up some years ago in an article about regular vs irregular verbs. The crux of the article seemed to be that the general long-term route is for irregular versions to be slowly edged out by regular versions, but very occasionally an irregular version comes to prominence. In this context, "snuck" was listed as the most recent coinage of an irregular verb. Trouble is, having no idea where I read that I don't know if it had any real valid basis in grammatical study or was just someone's thoughts. I rather like snuck, as you could probably surmise by my use of it in the first place.
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Post by Verbivore on Apr 13, 2018 22:34:54 GMT
’StrayaFWIW, I pronounce my nation’s name as OssTRAYlia. Perhaps I’m just not Strine enough.
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Post by Verbivore on Apr 13, 2018 22:42:24 GMT
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Post by Verbivore on Apr 13, 2018 22:45:10 GMT
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Post by Verbivore on Apr 13, 2018 22:46:55 GMT
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Post by Verbivore on Apr 13, 2018 23:07:05 GMT
To versus till / ’til / untilA daily irritation for me is the use of to when till / ’til / until would better suit the context, e.g. from ten to two (o’clock) rather than from ten till two. Without the o’clock or a.m. / p.m. markers, it can read as ten minutes to two, not the same thing at all. Here is a good example of the misuse of to leading to an odd notion – that of “crawling to death”. “‘Men are overrepresented in all injuries pretty much from the age we start crawling to death,’ Rebecca Ivers, director of the injury division at The George Institute for Global Health, said.” PS: The reference is quite a way down the graphics-heavy page. Easiest just to search for “crawling” in your browser once on the page.
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Post by Verbivore on Apr 14, 2018 3:52:21 GMT
What is wrong (and right) about the following statement?
The cow jumps more than the moon and she does it over twenty times.
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Post by Dave Miller on Apr 14, 2018 14:40:01 GMT
What is wrong (and right) about the following statement? The cow jumps more than the moon and she does it over twenty times. I like it! I recall explaining to an American colleague why I cringed at his habit of saying things like “ ... cost in excess of two million pounds”. When I said that “over two million” was neater and less pompous, he insisted that he didn't mean “over”. For him, that meant only ‘in a location higher than’. The difference, between the two meanings relating to location and amount, is what causes the problem in your quotation, Vv. The amount is referenced in “over (or more than) twenty times”, but the physical location of the cow above the moon demands “over”, not “more than”.
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