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"Grammar Geekery" - A Washington Post Column Written by Bill Walsh


DonRocks

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(Scroll down and read the third paragraph of Post #4)

It's Attorneys General, not Attorney Generals.

Now, if someone would only point me to the generally accepted rules for capitalization in titles, I would be in their debt. I don't know what they are, so I tend to capitalize most everything, sometimes making exceptions for words that are two-letters or less.

The 1990 Iraq War changed the meaning of the term "decimate" forever. At least research the original etymology, and be aware that it has been bastardized within the past 25 years. This one bothered me for a long time, and is a concrete example that if you don't stand up early on and fight, things will slip away before your very eyes - forever.

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Per one of the cups above - - I didn't even know that less/fewer were one of those confusing/often used improperly words until recently.

I'm still not sure what the problem or issue is, and I've been likely misusing both of them, but since I discovered it, I've been seeing it pop up all over the place.

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Per one of the cups above - - I didn't even know that less/fewer were one of those confusing/often used improperly words until recently.

I'm still not sure what the problem or issue is, and I've been likely misusing both of them, but since I discovered it, I've been seeing it pop up all over the place.

This is one that never bothered me because I don't think it's violated very often, but if you visualize it, you can "see" that "fewer" refers to individually countable items. Using that as your base, it's easier to see that "less" refers to a blobbish mass, or fungible items such as rice, grass, sand on a beach, etc.  ("There's less orange juice in my glass than yours." - I suspect you've been intuitively using this correctly all along because you'd never say, "There's fewer orange juice in my glass than yours." On the other hand, you might say, "There are less apples on my plate than yours," so maybe this is the way it's usually mistaken.)  Note that if the container goes from being a "plate" to an "industrial-sized bin," the items become fungible, i.e., uncountable, and it becomes correct to use "less." I think. "There seem to be less apples in that five-ton bin on the left."

Related: "The snowflakes are beautiful!" I understand you have the option of saying, "The snow is beautiful!" but who looks at individual snowflakes? And yet, saying "The snowflakes is beautiful" sounds completely, totally wrong; unlike "The rice is good." Thought: Maybe it has to do with the "s" on the end which forces a plural?

BTW, Bill on Capitol Hill runs a very entertaining chat (and occasional column) involving this very thing, called "Grammar Geekery," and now that I'm thinking about it, I'm going to dedicate this post to him. I have never seen him write something that doesn't make good sense, and I'm *so* happy to find out he's a proponent of the singular "they" ("Whenever one of my family members shows up, they're treated like royalty.") It's either that, or fuss with (s)he's, etc. which I hate.

Regarding the first question in that chat, I researched the proper use of "myself" many years ago, and it stuck with me. From what I read, there are three, and only three, times when you can use it and not sound like a boxer being interviewed after getting pummeled.

1) As a reflexive (i.e., the subject and object are both the same person): "I hurt myself."

2) As an intensive (i.e, for emphasis that you're talking about yourself <--- see that reflexive usage there?): "I, myself, wouldn't do such a thing."

3) As a quasi-noun meaning "my one, true self": "I'm just not myself today."

That said, in all three of these examples, "I" has already been referenced, so Bill's simpler answer may well be sufficient. Now that you've read this, you're going to notice how many *idiots* giving speeches or being interviewed use "myself" as an object - sometimes even a subject - to try and sound educated. ("My wife and myself personally flew over the disaster area ....")

And all this grammar geekery having been said, I, myself, :) write like I talk, so I often know I'm making a mistake, and do it anyway 'cuz it's what I'm shootin' fer. Still, it's nice to at least know what's correct so you can make an informed choice. You can be a black belt in karate and never let anyone know.

I've just decided it might be fun to bring back some obsolete terms. ("You ignorant funge!")

I'm also curious if anyone here has ever needed to make a dash because of their colon or their period.

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(Scroll down and read the third paragraph of Post #4)

Now, if someone would only point me to the generally accepted rules for capitalization in titles, I would be in their debt. I don't know what they are, so I tend to capitalize most everything, sometimes making exceptions for words that are two-letters or less.

As a one-time copy editor, I can give you the Chicago Manual of Style rules for capitalizing titles (from a 30-year-old memory; I can't quote them): Capitalize the first and last word, no matter what they are. Otherwise, don't capitalize articles and prepositions, no matter how long they are. Do capitalize every other word, no matter how short. Thus, an imaginary book title: He Is without Mercy. I think most American style sheets follow this practice, as do most UK sources. It's obviously very different in other languages.

The 1990 Iraq War changed the meaning of the term "decimate" forever. At least research the original etymology, and be aware that it has been bastardized within the past 25 years. This one bothered me for a long time, and is a concrete example that if you don't stand up early on and fight, things will slip away before your very eyes - forever.

Ahem. The usage you decry is much older than you imagine. From the OED entry:

b. rhetorically or loosely. To destroy or remove a large proportion of; to subject to severe loss, slaughter, or mortality.

1663   J. Spencer Disc. Prodigies vi. 96   The..Lord..sometimes decimates a multitude of offenders, and discovers in the personal sufferings of a few what all deserve.

1812   W. Taylor in Monthly Rev. 79 181   An expurgatory index, pointing out the papers which it would be fatiguing to peruse, and thus decimating the contents into legibility.

1848   C. Brontí« Let. 28 Aug. in E. C. Gaskell Life C. Brontí« (1857) II. ii. 76   Typhus fever decimated the school periodically.

1875   C. Lyell Princ. Geol. II. iii. xlii. 466   The whole animal Creation has been decimated again and again.

1877   H. M. Field Lakes of Killarney 340   This conscription weighs very heavily on the Mussulmen..who are thus decimated from year to year.

1883   L. Oliphant Haifa (1887) 76   Cholera..was then decimating the country.

I don't actually remember the loose sense of "decimate" figuring largely in the discourse of that particular conflict, but I was probably preoccupied with other aspects of it.

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Related: "The snowflakes are beautiful!" I understand you have the option of saying, "The snow is beautiful!" but who looks at individual snowflakes? And yet, saying "The snowflakes is beautiful" sounds completely, totally wrong; unlike "The rice is good." Thought: Maybe it has to do with the "s" on the end which forces a plural?

It's count vs. non-count nouns. Snow is non-count, so you use "less;" snowflakes are count, so you use "fewer." Rice is like snow; we don't talk about "rices" unless we're talking about different varieties. And this is one of those things that I actually learned as a teacher of English as a foreign language that I previously just did without thinking.

Azami (also an EFL teacher) tells me that prescriptively (i.e., the rule), you should use "less" and "fewer" as described above. Descriptively, we use "less" for both count and non-count nouns: "There are fewer cars on 16th Street today" and "There are less cars on 16th Street today." Generally, we don't use "fewer" with non-count nouns.

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I don't actually remember the loose sense of "decimate" figuring largely in the discourse of that particular conflict, but I was probably preoccupied with other aspects of it.

Wolf Blitzer used it incessantly. I was an adult, and I remember the war coverage being the first time I'd ever noticed the term, and got very annoyed at how often reporters used it - so, that at least means something, though I'm not sure how much.

On other notes, can you imagine a Pentagon Correspondent with a more appropriate name than Wolf Blitzer?

Trivia: Did you know that Wolf Blitzer never set foot in Iraq? Many people "remember" him reporting from the front lines; he never left Arlington.

It's count vs. non-count nouns. Snow is non-count, so you use "less;" snowflakes are count, so you use "fewer." Rice is like snow; we don't talk about "rices" unless we're talking about different varieties. And this is one of those things that I actually learned as a teacher of English as a foreign language that I previously just did without thinking.

Azami (also an EFL teacher) tells me that prescriptively (i.e., the rule), you should use "less" and "fewer" as described above. Descriptively, we use "less" for both count and non-count nouns: "There are fewer cars on 16th Street today" and "There are less cars on 16th Street today." Generally, we don't use "fewer" with non-count nouns.

This is my point: Nobody in the history of the world has ever counted snowflakes! I understand the word "flakes" *sounds* like a countable noun, but in reality, snowflakes are not countable. And I guess you could say the same thing about Corn Flakes.

(More of a bemused observation than an actual complaint.)

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Wolf Blitzer used it incessantly. I was an adult, and I remember the war coverage being the first time I'd ever noticed the term, and got very annoyed at how often reporters used it - so, that at least means something, though I'm not sure how much.

I didn't have cable service in 1990-91, so CNN was not part of my world. It still isn't, but for other reasons.

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Re: Capitalization in titles. I left out conjunctions. Aside from the first and last words of a title, which are capitalized no matter what, you don't capitalize articles, conjunctions, or prepositions, no matter their length. You capitalize all other words, also no matter their length.

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Re: Capitalization in titles. I left out conjunctions. Aside from the first and last words of a title, which are capitalized no matter what, you don't capitalize articles, conjunctions, or prepositions, no matter their length. You capitalize all other words, also no matter their length.

So in other words: "I Left My Heart in San Francisco because a Nun Came Up to Me and Impaled Me with an Umbrella, Thus Causing My Cardiac Unit To Plop Out of the Newly Formed Gash in My Sternum?"

It's too bad leleboo moved - this stuff is right up her alley.

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So in other words: "I Left My Heart in San Francisco because a Nun Came Up to Me and Impaled Me with an Umbrella, Thus Causing My Cardiac Unit To Plop Out of the Newly Formed Gash in My Sternum?"

It's too bad leleboo moved - this stuff is right up her alley.

I believe at least one word in your title is "wrong" under the Chicago or similar rules, but only because I probably misstated the rules. "To" in "to plop" is a "particle" that acts as a marker of the infinitive verb, and is treated as a preposition in determining whether to capitalize. While "up" is often a preposition, in "she came up to me" I think it's either an adverb or part of a phrasal verb (to come up) and should be capitalized in your title, as you did. Now that I think about it, though, isn't "thus" in your title a conjunction, and not to be capitalized? A very thorny issue.

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...

This is my point: Nobody in the history of the world has ever counted snowflakes! I understand the word "flakes" *sounds* like a countable noun, but in reality, snowflakes are not countable. And I guess you could say the same thing about Corn Flakes.

(More of a bemused observation than an actual complaint.)

Snowflakes are visibly plural. Just because no one can get a complete count doesn't mean they aren't "countable." It's like thousands of speeding cars on two hypothetical Los Angeles freeways as viewed from a small plane at low altitude. You could begin counting but not get a complete or accurate count. Thus, still countable and we might observe that "Freeway X typically has fewer cars than Freeway Y at rush hour."

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I first time I tried sea urchin I was less than 10 years old and was by our Japanese hostess warned that I would not like it.  She was right.  The second time I loved it.  Although I cannot remember my first bite of Indian pickle, I am certain it was a similar circumstance.  

Forgive me for veering wildly off topic, but wouldn't it be funny if a grammar nazi swooped in and insisted it should be "fewer than 10 years old"?

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Forgive me for veering wildly off topic, but wouldn't it be funny if a grammar nazi swooped in and insisted it should be "fewer than 10 years old"?

Wouldn't it be even funnier if a Nazi moderator moved your post to the "Grammar Geekery" thread? :lol:

"A place for everything, and everything in its place."

-- Charles A. Goodrich, a former website host who lost all his readers

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Forgive me for veering wildly off topic, but wouldn't it be funny if a grammar nazi swooped in and insisted it should be "fewer than 10 years old"?

The reason we correctly use less, not fewer, in this instance (less than 10 years old) is because in English the convention for denoting age is to use the verb "to be" not "to have."  The use of the verb "be" logically causes age to become a quantity, not a count. If we instead used the verb "have," as they do in Spanish, then we would indeed say he has fewer than 10 years. But as it is, we are speaking of a quantity of age, not a count of years, so we correctly say "less than 10 years." Got that?

One way I assess the classiness of supermarkets is by looking at their express line signs.  Wegmans' and Publix's, for example, say "fewer than 10 items", while Winn-Dixie (and I'm pretty sure Wal-mart) say "less than 10 items." You can pick up clues about a company from things like that.  I can't say about Safeway and Giant since I don't live in DC these days.

Speaking of Wolf Blitzer, one of my pet peeves about CNN is the constant use of epicenter when center would do. This particular malaprop is showing up everywhere these days.   Using "epicenter" is an attempt to make something seem really really the very very center of whatever it is, but of course center is already a superlative -- you can't be any more at the center of something than the center.  Epicenter actually has only one valid meaning: it is the point on the earth's surface directly above the center of an earthquake, so it's not even a "center" to start with.  The ultimate stupidity occurred on CNN yesterday when they said "the epicenter of the earthquake was 50 miles below the surface." Stupidity is as stupidity does.

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Speaking of Wolf Blitzer, one of my pet peeves about CNN is the constant use of epicenter when center would do. This particular malaprop is showing up everywhere these days.   Using "epicenter" is an attempt to make something seem really really the very very center of whatever it is, but of course center is already a superlative -- you can't be any more at the center of something than the center.  Epicenter actually has only one valid meaning: it is the point on the earth's surface directly above the center of an earthquake, so it's not even a "center" to start with.  The ultimate stupidity occurred on CNN yesterday when they said "the epicenter of the earthquake was 50 miles below the surface." Stupidity is as stupidity does.

Before this big snowstorm hit, I overheard someone say that we were in the "epic center" of the storm. He really seemed to think it was the right phrase. For all intensive purposes, in this case, it's a good description.

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Before this big snowstorm hit, I overheard someone say that we were in the "epic center" of the storm. He really seemed to think it was the right phrase. For all intensive purposes, in this case, it's a good description.

Wow!  Two eggcorns in one post, one a compound eggcorn/malaprop, and the second used to comment on the first.

We are all susceptible.

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The reason we correctly use less, not fewer, in this instance (less than 10 years old) is because in English the convention for denoting age is to use the verb "to be" not "to have."  The use of the verb "be" logically causes age to become a quantity, not a count. If we instead used the verb "have," as they do in Spanish, then we would indeed say he has fewer than 10 years. But as it is, we are speaking of a quantity of age, not a count of years, so we correctly say "less than 10 years." Got that?

 

I love how you've replaced the flawed nazi of my imagining with a more nearly perfect nazi of your own. Your argument by analogy with a language that makes no grammatical distinction between "less" and "fewer" elevates this whole topic to pure comedy gold.

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I love how you've replaced the flawed nazi of my imagining with a more nearly perfect nazi of your own. Your argument by analogy with a language that makes no grammatical distinction between "less" and "fewer" elevates this whole topic to pure comedy gold.

It's true that Spanish doesn't make that distinction, but that fact doesn't change or even affect the logic as it applies in the case of English (in fact it's not a grammatical distinction -- Spanish simply uses the same word for both).  It was only an attempt to add some explanation to express the idea, not lean on Spanish as some sort of guide.  One could remove the "Spanish" reference entirely and the same conclusion would still be there.

Anyway, if that makes me a nearly perfect grammar nazi, that's fine by me.

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Forgive me for veering wildly off topic, but wouldn't it be funny if a grammar nazi swooped in and insisted it should be "fewer than 10 years old"?

I love how you've replaced the flawed nazi of my imagining with a more nearly perfect nazi of your own. Your argument by analogy with a language that makes no grammatical distinction between "less" and "fewer" elevates this whole topic to pure comedy gold.

I'm not saying I'm correct, but I'm not sure I agree with the "fewer than 10 years old" claim. Why should it be fewer? I don't think it has anything to do with "to be" and 'to have" (does it?); it has to do with treating the things as either a single blob, or individual, countable units. 10 years is a quasi-single blob, at least to me, and I feel sorry for the poor kid that says "I'm fewer than 10 years old" in school - I don't know anyone who says "fewer" regarding their age. ("How old are you?" "Um, I'm less than 40" (with "years" being implied)) <--- Where do I put the period(s) here?

"In fewer than three years, the world will come to an end." Assuming that were true, you'd be counting not only every year, but every second. Yet, "fewer" sounds effete as hell here. I think part of it is because "years" aren't atomic units when it comes to time, which is a continuous process involving months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, seconds, microseconds, etc. Hell, even *atoms* aren't atomic units when you're dealing with quantum physics.

All this said, a good writer knows the rules and sticks to them; a great writer knows the rules and uses them as suggestions. Sort of like how I use a speed limit sign. :)

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I'm not saying I'm correct, but I'm not sure I agree with the "fewer than 10 years old" claim. Why should it be fewer?

Holy Jesus, I thought when I started with "wouldn't it be funny" it would be obvious that what followed -- an imaginary misguided grammar nazi making the ridiculous claim that it should be "fewer than 10 years old" -- was to be taken as a joke. That as many as two people started arguing with the imaginary nazi tells me I don't tell jokes so good.

But still, a man goes to the doctor. The doctor says "I've got some bad news and some worse news." "Oh my goodness," says the man, "what's the bad news?" The doctor says "You've only got 24 hours to live." The man reels a bit and then asks the doctor what's the worse news. The doctor says "I was supposed to tell you yesterday."

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Speaking of Wolf Blitzer, one of my pet peeves about CNN is the constant use of epicenter when center would do. This particular malaprop is showing up everywhere these days.   Using "epicenter" is an attempt to make something seem really really the very very center of whatever it is, but of course center is already a superlative -- you can't be any more at the center of something than the center.  Epicenter actually has only one valid meaning: it is the point on the earth's surface directly above the center of an earthquake, so it's not even a "center" to start with.  The ultimate stupidity occurred on CNN yesterday when they said "the epicenter of the earthquake was 50 miles below the surface." Stupidity is as stupidity does.

Holy Jesus

Depending on your religion, Holy Jesus is another example of this malaprop. 573af0657dd0c3cf8f40801b7fc76a26.jpg

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(I don't suppose anyone is going to figure out the humor in the preceding post.)

Well, the lady pictured above was Eliza Sheridan, née Linley, who was married to Richard Brinsley Sheridan, the Georgian-era Irish playwright and long-time Whig Member of Parliament. Mrs. Malaprop, who uttered mangled expressions to comic effect, was a character in Sheridan's play The Rivals. A "malapropism" generally involves the use of a word or words similar to but not actually the same as the word or words wanted. "I resemble that remark" is a well-known example. If you're referring to johnb's complaint about "epicenter" I wouldn't call that a malapropism, because it's used deliberately, if foolishly, and has no comic effect. Similarly, if your reference to my "Holy Jesus" rests on the notion that to a Christian, Jesus is by definition holy, then you might characterize "Holy Jesus" as a pleonasm or possibly a tautology, and if any comic effect may have been achieved, it was not through the use of a wrong word. "Holistic Jesus" might be considered a malapropism. In short, I can't figure out the humor in your post.

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On 1/26/2016 at 11:44 PM, DonRocks said:

(I don't suppose anyone is going to figure out the humor in the preceding post.)

On 1/27/2016 at 3:32 PM, The Hersch said:

Well, the lady pictured above was Eliza Sheridan, née Linley, who was married to Richard Brinsley Sheridan, the Georgian-era Irish playwright and long-time Whig Member of Parliament. Mrs. Malaprop, who uttered mangled expressions to comic effect, was a character in Sheridan's play The Rivals. A "malapropism" generally involves the use of a word or words similar to but not actually the same as the word or words wanted. "I resemble that remark" is a well-known example. If you're referring to johnb's complaint about "epicenter" I wouldn't call that a malapropism, because it's used deliberately, if foolishly, and has no comic effect. Similarly, if your reference to my "Holy Jesus" rests on the notion that to a Christian, Jesus is by definition holy, then you might characterize "Holy Jesus" as a pleonasm or possibly a tautology, and if any comic effect may have been achieved, it was not through the use of a wrong word. "Holistic Jesus" might be considered a malapropism. In short, I can't figure out the humor in your post.

The humor was that I used the wrong word - it should have been "forthcoming" instead of "preceding." :lol: 

That said, the intelligence in this community never fails to amaze me, even though it may appeal to only about 1% of people.

(There's an implied caption coming out of Mrs. Sheridan's mouth which says, "You're running afoul of my husband's word.")

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I was going to start a separate thread, but I guess until we have a separate Grammar Forum, grammar posts can all go in here. I looked up the precise differences between these two words, and found a really simple rule to use - it may not be exactly correct, but I'm going to use it until I'm shown that I shouldn't. It must be noted that these two words are essentially interchangeable, and only Grammar Geeks would possibly care about the difference.

Thereby vs. Therefore

These two words are (almost) always preceded by ... something, either in the same sentence, or in the sentence immediately preceding. I like this rule because it uses parts of the words in the definition, helping you to remember:

Thereby - "By that means"

"If you cut through the alley, you'll avoid two stoplights, thereby getting you to your destination earlier."

Therefore - "For that reason"

"The sun can damage your retinas, therefore you should never look directly into it."

So you can look at whatever precedes the word, and figure out which of the two makes more sense.

The biggest takeaway from this post is probably that there is precious little difference between the two terms, and anyone who would chide you for using one over the other should have a Scarlet "L" stamped on their forehead.

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I don't think "thereby" and "therefore" are often confused with each other, at least in writing. What really does bug me is people who seem to think that "therefor" (meaning for that purpose, for that thing) is a classy alternative spelling of "therefore". The same applies to "discrete" for "discreet".

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On 2/21/2015 at 11:18 PM, DonRocks said:

(Scroll down and read the third paragraph of Post #4)

It's Attorneys General, not Attorney Generals.

Now, if someone would only point me to the generally accepted rules for capitalization in titles, I would be in their debt. I don't know what they are, so I tend to capitalize most everything, sometimes making exceptions for words that are two-letters or less.

The 1990 Iraq War changed the meaning of the term "decimate" forever. At least research the original etymology, and be aware that it has been bastardized within the past 25 years. This one bothered me for a long time, and is a concrete example that if you don't stand up early on and fight, things will slip away before your very eyes - forever.

I'm pretty comfortable with how I've come to terms with capitalizing titles, except for one thing: pronouns. 

Suppose I'm writing a thread title here that reads:

"Bill Walsh - We Will Always Miss his Knowledge and Wit"

Would the word "his" be capitalized? (Yes, this thread will remain named after Bill.)

I don't have any problem capitalizing "We" since it's after a dash, and the start of a sentence.

I no longer capitalize conjunctions, hence the lowercase "a" in "and."

"Always" is an adverb modifying the verb "Miss" (or "Will Miss" if you like), and I'm going to capitalize adverbs.

But I'm struggling with pronouns - for example, "Everybody," e.g.

"Is Everybody Happy with Things at the New Restaurant?"

It would really trouble me not to capitalize "Everybody," but I'm not sure why.

I've decided to capitalize all verbs, even "Is" and "Are," e.g. "Will Be Going" - all three get capitalized.

Prepositions and articles: no capitalization, e.g., "Will Be Going to the Store."

Pronouns are my last personal hurdle. Don't forget I have some weird OCD thing, so I need some sort of guideline.

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You capitalize pronouns in titles because the Chicago Manual of Style tells you to. There can be no more compelling reason than that. However, in your title, "his" in "His Knowledge and Wit" is a possessive adjective (note how it modifies rather than replaces a noun), not a pronoun, and you capitalize that also because the Chicago Manual tells you to.

This is really orthography, not grammar, by the way.

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What's the difference between "polish" and "burnish?"

When I think of burnish, I picture English wood (no, not Grant's Johnson, presidential as that may sound), but I don't think the word is limited to that, and it may be only because it sounds like "burl" (which is a knot that can be burnished, even though burl's etymology comes from words meaning "wool"). 

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15 minutes ago, DonRocks said:

What's the difference between "polish" and "burnish?"

When I think of burnish, I picture English wood (no, not Grant's Johnson, presidential as that may sound), but I don't think the word is limited to that, and it may be only because it sounds like "burl" (which is a knot that can be burnished, even though burl's etymology comes from words meaning "wool"). 

When the substance is wood I think that they are synonymous, although to woodworkers I'm sure there is some technical difference in the finish.  For metal, though, the distinction is pretty clear: polished metal surfaces are reflective, whereas burnished metal leaves some of the grinding or sanding marks rendering it duller.

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2 minutes ago, TedE said:

For metal, though, the distinction is pretty clear: polished metal surfaces are reflective, whereas burnished metal leaves some of the grinding or sanding marks rendering it duller.

Thank you - I had no idea. Can you point to a reference that has a more in-depth discussion of this? I'm interested in reading more.

Now I'm wondering if "burnish" and "burl" may somehow be related words.

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On 7/26/2017 at 9:42 AM, DonRocks said:

Thank you - I had no idea. Can you point to a reference that has a more in-depth discussion of this? I'm interested in reading more.

Now I'm wondering if "burnish" and "burl" may somehow be related words.

I'm sure there is some in depth technical discussion out there but I don't know of it!  That was just my $0.02 about the two senses of that word.  A quick Google indicates that, for metals, burnishing is mechanical smoothing of a surface whereas polishing involves actual removal of the surface layer.  That I didn't know.  I don't see any noted differences for woods, but I'm sure there is a difference somewhere.

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Has anyone noticed, recently, a trend towards saying "Yeah, no, ..." when agreeing with someone, or acknowledging something they're saying? They say it so quickly that nobody notices (even they don't notice), but I noticed this about six months ago, and now it stands out like fingers on a chalkboard - not in a bad way, but just in a very noticeable way. Unfortunately, you're going to begin noticing now, too.

Carla: "I thought you were going to dye your hair red."

Jane: "Yeah, no, I decided to leave it the way it was."

In French, for example, there are two words for "yes": "oui," and "si." The first is total agreement; the second is more like "agreement with a change," e.g.:

<<Je pensais qu'il aille a Paris.>> ("I thought he would go to Paris.")

<<Si, il a decidé aller a Lyon.>> ("Yeah, no, he decided to go to Lyon.") - The "Yeah" acknowledges that the speaker had reason to think that, but the "no" indicates a change is coming in the sentence.

Or even disagreement:

<<Tu ne peux pas le faire!>> ("You can't do it!")

<<Si, je peux le faire!>> ("Yes, I can do it!" - if you're being defiant) or ("Yeah, no, I can do it!" - if you're being reassuring).

Has anyone noticed this? Do we need something more elegant than "Yeah, no" in English - something akin to the French "Si?"

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On 8/7/2017 at 9:41 AM, Dr. Delicious said:

There was a "Grammar Geekery" moment on Game of Thrones last night (ep. #64):

"How many men do we have in the North to fight him?" Jon Snow asks Davos Seaworth of the Night King. "Ten thousand? Less?"

"Fewer," corrects Davos under his breath.

Well, that depends if you consider them as individuals, or a lump! :)

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Two of my big pet peeves:

* Disgusting - Something is disgusting if, and only if, it is anti-gustatory. In other words, it makes you not want to eat, or nauseated - for example, finding maggots in your Corn Flakes is disgusting. Making a politically incorrect Tweet isn't disgusting; it might be deplorable, reprehensible, or unforgivable, but it is most certainly *not* disgusting. Now that you've read this, you'll find this to be one of the most overused adjectives currently in the American lexicon.

* Nauseous - If you're nauseous, then you make others nauseated, period. Yes, our modern-day English is accepting the improper definition of the word, just as it has done with "decimated," but these are two distinct words, with two distinct meanings: Something nauseous has properties which induce nausea.

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On 6/25/2018 at 3:50 PM, DaveO said:

San Francisco is so expensive servers are priced out of the housing market:  Hence full service restaurants and no wait staff.

"San Francisco Restaurants Can't Afford Waiters. So They're Putting Diners To Work" by Emily Badget on mobile.nytimes.com [bold emphasis my own - DR]

Regarding the bolded "To Work" fragment, is it a prepositional  phrase in the form of an adverb, i.e., "how are they 'Putting Diners?'" In this case, "to" would be a preposition, and "work" would be a noun, and "to work" would functionally serve as an adverb, modifying the verb, "Putting."  It's also masquerading as the infinitive of a verb, i.e., "To Work," but I think that's a red herring.

---

ETA - I guess it's exactly as if they'd written "putting diners to bed" - "to" is a preposition, and "bed" is a noun - a prepositional phrase, I guess.

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Regarding the transient verb, "to freeze" - I don't think I was ever sure about the past tense (as in, "The ice freezes the tracks"). I had accidentally written "freezed," as it relates to freezing a video, before I caught myself. The conjugations of the word appear to be consistent regardless of whether you're talking about it being "freezing outside," or "freezing a movie" - there's no such word as "freezed."

This is also one of those words that begins to look strange, the more you look at it.

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