posted
Huh. It would never occur to me to use that term unless I was referring to shipping something using FedEx. Does anyone here use that term in a generic way?
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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The new Scrabble dictionary defines it as "to send by Federal Express." I have heard it used in a more generic way once or twice, meaning, I suppose, something more like sending a package overnight. "Drat, my sister's birthday is Tuesday! I better go find something and fedex it by tonight!" But it isn't really clear that that is a generic usage. So I dunno.
Posts: 628 | Registered: Nov 1999
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Oh, and on my dream list of things to buy eventually? The OED. I want to be able to leaf through it, on the floor on my stomach maybe -- not on CD, not on-line... page by page, just filling my mind with the words.
Posts: 628 | Registered: Nov 1999
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posted
I have a compact OED. It's the crowning jewel in my small book collection. And get this: I got it for free from work when we were cleaning out the office. They were going to donate it to a thrift store!
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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Yup. Entymology is just one of the hundreds of thousands of words available in the Oxford English Dictionary.
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Sharpie: I am very jealous!
Unfortunately, I don't use it as much as I should. First off, it's an enormous book. Second, you need a magnifying glass to read it—literally. Good thing it came with one, though. Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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But yes, it does. That was the feature that set the OED apart back when they first started the project. The CD-ROM and website have simply carried that over.
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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I've looked at the compact one (for the life of me, I can't remember where) and really liked the look of it, magnifying glass and all. It's probably not a surprise that I have a shelf full of dictionaries already.
Tonight I played Scrabble (of course) with one of the guys who has been a major contributor to the Scrabble dictionary projects over the years. He told me before the game that although he wasn't as active in it this time around, he was responsible for adding several words to the current version, including "soulmate". I swear I felt a tingle talking to him.
Posts: 628 | Registered: Nov 1999
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We've got the "Short Oxford English Dictionary" from 1959; it's STILL heavier than Webster's Lexicon whatsies that my father got in 1988.
Posts: 358 | Registered: May 2005
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For what it's worth Teshi, I had to mentally stop and make sure that I was using the right word with those two for *years* before I finally stopped having a problem with saying the one in place of the other.
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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quote:Originally posted by Haloed Silhouette: When's the Third Edition of the OED coming out, by the way?
Well, they started it in 1990, and they're all the way to Paul right now. Maybe in another decade or so.
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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I thought so too, but just Google (the verb, correct or not) a string containing "entymology" and see what appears.
Posts: 358 | Registered: May 2005
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The road of linguistic ignorance, you mean! Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny.
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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Hmm. Those are all English words, and the syntax seems good, but for the life of me I can't figure out what you're saying.
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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posted
*Thumps Jon Boy over the head with a shelf upon which the 32-volume edition of the [i]Encyclopædia Britannica lies bound and removed the words "almost" and "laughing" from Jon Boy's previous post.*
*Reports post for threat of violence* (not serious).
posted
Hm. This thread title is disappointing. I was hoping to catch my husband slipping up in some way with the English language just so I could tease him about it, and I come in here to find he's perfect as usual. Posts: 1903 | Registered: Sep 2003
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quote:Originally posted by Haloed Silhouette: *Thumps Jon Boy over the head with a shelf upon which the 32-volume edition of the [i]Encyclopædia Britannica lies bound and removed the words "almost" and "laughing" from Jon Boy's previous post.*
There's that pesky nonparallelism again. So sad.
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Haloed Silhouette: *Reminds Jon Boy that "bind" is a strong verb and therefore it's form in the past-simle tense is "bound".*
His problem is comprehension.
*reminds JH that if you want to be possessive, it's just I-T-S, but if it's supposed to be a contraction, then it's I-T-apostrophe-S*
So, um, where exactly did I use an incorrect form of the bind? Or were you just trying to lecture me in a subject that I already know about?
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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posted
*Alerts Jon Boy that "s" and "d" are very close on the QWERTY keyboard and it's a typo.*
*Reminds Jon Boy that strictly speaking - the possessive form is apostrophe-s, and therefore "its" should be "it's".*
I was - again - "just checking". One day I'll catch you again regarding one of your imperfect mistakes. We're all human.
Posts: 358 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Haloed Silhouette: *Reminds Jon Boy that strictly speaking - the possessive form is apostrophe-s, and therefore "its" should be "it's".*
The possessive form of regular nouns is apostrophe-s. The possessive forms of pronouns are not the same thing. I remember explaining this once, but maybe you weren't listening. Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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quote:No, because those are Viking structures, not Latin.
Not quite. They're all English, but the neuter possessive pronoun (his) began to be confused with the masculine possessive pronoun. For a while people tried different things (still using his, using thereof to avoid the issue altogether, using of it, etc.), and eventually the construction its won popularity because it declined like the other possessive pronouns.
Posts: 1903 | Registered: Sep 2003
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I was, but you were not referring to "its". And the reason for some pronoun differences - so I've been told by my father (a linguist who studied and studies Latin, German, Italian, French, Gaelic and ancient Norse) - is because of Viking influence. He's sleeping now, though.
Posts: 358 | Registered: May 2005
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