Words, usages, and phrases that annoy the shit out of you...

Message Bookmarked
Bookmark Removed
Not all messages are displayed: show all messages (12538 of them)

jesus

karmic blowback for dissing pip and jane baker (Autumn Almanac), Monday, 13 April 2020 03:16 (six years ago)

divinely mandated, eh?

A is for (Aimless), Monday, 13 April 2020 03:26 (six years ago)

hosanna in eggshell sits

ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Monday, 13 April 2020 03:28 (six years ago)

that... that's just... I have no words

A is for (Aimless), Monday, 13 April 2020 03:31 (six years ago)

"Off of" is the only way in Our Queen's English to explain which TV programme you've seen an actor in before.

kinder, Monday, 13 April 2020 07:58 (six years ago)

What's wrong with 'from'?

The Corbynite Maneuver (Tom D.), Monday, 13 April 2020 08:24 (six years ago)

Exactly, you need a from

"that's him from off of The Bill"

Non, je ned raggette rien (onimo), Monday, 13 April 2020 09:43 (six years ago)

Didn't Based Offov used to play up front for Bulgaria?

Vanishing Point (Chinaski), Monday, 13 April 2020 10:00 (six years ago)

I believe The Man Off Of UNCLE was one of the most popular TV shows of the 60s.

The Corbynite Maneuver (Tom D.), Monday, 13 April 2020 11:00 (six years ago)

ricky gervaise offive the office

ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Monday, 13 April 2020 11:03 (six years ago)

'From' is kind of clunky, the Scottish 'fae' is much more elegant.

The Corbynite Maneuver (Tom D.), Monday, 13 April 2020 11:09 (six years ago)

Round our way it's 'frae'

Non, je ned raggette rien (onimo), Monday, 13 April 2020 11:09 (six years ago)

Indeed.

The Corbynite Maneuver (Tom D.), Monday, 13 April 2020 11:10 (six years ago)

outside of a horse, a dog is man’s best friend. inside of a horse it’s too dark to see.

- bob marley

Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Monday, 13 April 2020 11:17 (six years ago)

I need an around the frae girl

TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 13 April 2020 11:19 (six years ago)

Bamboo earrins

genital giant (Neanderthal), Monday, 13 April 2020 12:00 (six years ago)

based off of is good and correct

mark s, Monday, 13 April 2020 12:06 (six years ago)

im professional sub editor, i sub it in even if its not there

mark s, Monday, 13 April 2020 12:07 (six years ago)

With "off" being transitive I thought it didn't need "of," but I defer to you.

TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 13 April 2020 12:09 (six years ago)

rhythmic necessity

ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Monday, 13 April 2020 12:11 (six years ago)

Based af.

coviderunt omnes (pomenitul), Monday, 13 April 2020 12:13 (six years ago)

deems is correct, english has no actual rules except what feels good, to me
— bob marley again

mark s, Monday, 13 April 2020 12:16 (six years ago)

Don't let dem fool ya

genital giant (Neanderthal), Monday, 13 April 2020 12:25 (six years ago)

Emancipate yourself off of mental slavery

- Bob Marley

Non, je ned raggette rien (onimo), Monday, 13 April 2020 12:36 (six years ago)

dreadful quotes

calzino, Monday, 13 April 2020 12:38 (six years ago)

lolz! xp

Wuhan!! Got You All in Check (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Monday, 13 April 2020 12:41 (six years ago)

Get into my dreams
Get off of my car

genital giant (Neanderthal), Monday, 13 April 2020 13:13 (six years ago)

Get Offa my Dike

Fleetwood Machiavelli (Ye Mad Puffin), Monday, 13 April 2020 13:36 (six years ago)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWXnVOgzqvc

Fleetwood Machiavelli (Ye Mad Puffin), Monday, 13 April 2020 13:39 (six years ago)

based off of = based on?

weird woman in a bar (La Lechera), Monday, 13 April 2020 14:11 (six years ago)

"based off of" helps suggest that additional weird elements have crept in

mark s, Monday, 13 April 2020 14:40 (six years ago)

yep, analogous to copied off of = copied from (see also "got off on")

For some people "based off" is probably being parsed as a phrasal verb (and why wouldn't it, English famously has over ten thousand of them) so tacking a prepositional phrase at the end of it is perfectly natural. But if you insist the construction is "based + prepositional phrase" then "based off of" is not going to work for you.

avellano medio inglés (f. hazel), Monday, 13 April 2020 14:54 (six years ago)

i am an accelerationist descriptivist who is also a professional sub-editor, its wild over here

mark s, Monday, 13 April 2020 15:02 (six years ago)

f hazel always making sense
trying to explain phrasal verbs to my students always leads to long faces -- there are SO many of them and the meaning of each one is not logical. we talked about "take ____" once and it actually reduced our morale :-/

weird woman in a bar (La Lechera), Monday, 13 April 2020 15:25 (six years ago)

phrasal verbs are probably the most annoying thing about the english language, so intuitively understood by native speakers, so impenetrable to everyone else. I think being aware of them when grading your speech might be the biggest eureka moment for a novice esl teacher.

Wuhan!! Got You All in Check (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Monday, 13 April 2020 15:29 (six years ago)

the list of phrases with 'take' is only surpassed in ridiculousness by the many uses of 'set'

Wuhan!! Got You All in Check (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Monday, 13 April 2020 15:30 (six years ago)

yeah you could probably take fifty common verbs and the fifty most common prepositions and make a matrix of phrasal verb definitions from them that would be baffling in its randomness

avellano medio inglés (f. hazel), Monday, 13 April 2020 15:31 (six years ago)

a matrix out of

ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Monday, 13 April 2020 15:34 (six years ago)

thinking about phrasal verbs makes me equal parts frustrated and sad -- frustrated for myself as a teacher and sad for my students that i have to tell them "it's possible u will never learn this"

i do enjoy explaining the difference between a phrasal verb and a prepositional phrase though
that's doable

weird woman in a bar (La Lechera), Monday, 13 April 2020 15:34 (six years ago)

it always makes me smile when I think of my grandmother, who would routinely come down hard on us kids for the most trivial grammatical transgressions, but whose everyday speech was full of phrases like "don't take on so" and "get away with you"

avellano medio inglés (f. hazel), Monday, 13 April 2020 15:36 (six years ago)

take up
take out
take in
take with
take to
take after
take on

each with its own quite different distinct meaning

Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Monday, 13 April 2020 16:32 (six years ago)

the lovely Emma complained a lot about this iirc, see also every verb ever, i.e.

see to
see out
see around

etc

Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Monday, 13 April 2020 16:33 (six years ago)

take back
take forward
take away

ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Monday, 13 April 2020 16:34 (six years ago)

take down

sure lookit

ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Monday, 13 April 2020 16:34 (six years ago)

German is just as exasperating in this regard, perhaps even more so.

coviderunt omnes (pomenitul), Monday, 13 April 2020 16:36 (six years ago)

i like it

mark s, Monday, 13 April 2020 16:38 (six years ago)

The interesting thing to me (not a linguist) is that it seems difficult to impossible to explain the meaning of “take” alone in many of those verbs. “Take with” you can gloss “take” as “bring” but in “take after”, how could you possibly gloss the “take” half by itself? “Take after” just means “resemble”

silby, Monday, 13 April 2020 16:47 (six years ago)

it is impossible as each phrasal verb with take + [x] has a discrete meaning. also each phrasal verb usually has a regular action verb that could take (hehehe) its place.

we talked about "take ____" once and it actually reduced our morale :-/ you can see how frustrating it is for learners

weird woman in a bar (La Lechera), Monday, 13 April 2020 16:50 (six years ago)

take after is to follow

ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Monday, 13 April 2020 16:53 (six years ago)

covers someone being alike in more than just resemblance, i suppose

"im awful with money, i take after my father that way"

kind of thing

ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Monday, 13 April 2020 16:54 (six years ago)


You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.