tuitions in graffiti
Is there any nice and concise word for a person who is given private tuitions and the one for sb who makes graffiti?
28 comments • Posted in Expression
washeteria
Hi guys! I’ve just dug up 3 new lingual curiosities: ‘washeteria’, ‘yogurgitation’ and ‘in-a-gadda-da-meeting’. How do you like them? ‘washeteria’ sounds to me like a Spanish word ‘cafeteria’ so it probably means a place where you take a shower; ‘yogurgitation’ is nicely connected with ‘yoghurt’ but it suggests throwing it up; the third word refers to a meeting, which could have been done in half of the time it actually took. However its spelling seems to me a little bit exotic. Can you help with the explanation?
11 comments • Posted in Expression
“Zen” as an Adjective
I recently had the urge to use “Zen” to describe a way of traveling light, calm, and without want. However, after looking in a dictionary, I learned that “zen” is not listed as ever being an adjective. How can this be so? I am absolutely sure I have heard things being described as “zen” on television and in media. In a phrase such as “Zen garden” would “Zen” be an adjective, or would “Zen Garden” function as an entire, or proper, noun? Just wondering. Thanks.
15 comments • Posted in Expression
“In your debt”
A friend was thankful for a gift I gave him today and said to me, “I am in your debt. No, wait... you are in my debt. Thanks.”
I am now thinking about the meaning of these idioms. We’ve all heard variants of this (not using the word “indebted”):
1: “I am in your debt.” 2: “You are in my debt.” 3: “I am in debt to you. 4: “You are in debt to me.”
I am now unclear if the users of these phrases are using them correctly. Whom owes whom? Right now, I am seeing it like this: 1: Speaker is stating that listener owes something to speaker. 2: Statement that listener owes something to listener. 3: Speaker owes something to listener. 4: Statement that listener owes something to speaker.
Are these correct? Are there more clear variants of showing indebtedness (I now open the subject up to using the word “indebted”)?
3 comments • Posted in Expression
Color of People
A friend of mine told me that “colored people” is offensive, but “people of color” isn’t. As far as I can see, they mean exactly the same thing. Why is one offensive but not the other?
22 comments • Posted in Expression
Potatoes
‘Couch potato’ is a phrase, which everybody knows already. I’ve also found ‘mouse potato’, which means a person glued all the time to the computer or tv screen, (treated as one of the English neologisms). Do you know any other types of ‘potatoes’?
5 comments • Posted in Expression
OK
Does anyone know the origin of the word okay or O.K. or OK? I once heard that that has to do with French and is derived from some Mississippian dialect and so. Does that make any sense at all? The bad thing is that I do not quite remember what I was told, neither I remember the supposedly original French word.
4 comments • Posted in Expression
Looking for a word
Is there any informal, figurative and rather impolite way of calling someone lazy? Any slang etc.?
13 comments • Posted in Expression
At or in
Which one is correct? “As far back as I remember, the country was at war.” “As far back as I remember, the country was in war.” If both are correct, what’s the difference?
9 comments • Posted in Expression
Lacking Smell
What is the word for the olive oil or garlic whose smell has been taken away? What’s the verb and what the noun? (And does anyone know how they do it?!)
1 comment • Posted in Expression
The
Why are the music instruments in the definite form when they are “being played” in the sentences? “I play THE guitar”
8 comments • Posted in Expression
negating
How do you negate the word deliberate? Undelibertae is not correct according to dictionaries. What then?
4 comments • Posted in Expression
F word
When do you use “mother fucker” and when do you use “mother fucking”? Does the later indicate a kind of dialect?
6 comments • Posted in Expression
...t you
The T which meets the word YOU is usually pronounced somewhat like CH, right? Such as “got ya!” or “what you...”. Just wonder how one can write the sound. Is there an agreeable way to write it? As we almost agree to write “gotta” for “have got to”?
11 comments • Posted in Expression
No Woman No Cry
The meaning of “No Woman No Cry” is now controversial in Japan. “No Woman No Cry” is a title of a song written by Bob Marley, a famous Jamaican Reggae artist. I’ve thought that the meaning is “There is no woman who does not cry”. However, someone says the meaning is “Women! Do not cry !”. I’d like to know the explanation by English native speakers. Thank you.
150 comments • Posted in Expression
P & K
Does anyone know what happened to the poor P of the psychology? Why is it silent? Why is it written? Does anybody also know why the K in know, knife, knee etc. is mute? I guess it has nothing to do with Kafka! Does it?
5 comments • Posted in Expression
Punctuation
Where do we put question mark, dot, exclamation mark etc. when a sentence ends with a quotation mark? Before or after the closing quotation mark? (”...where?” or “...where”?) or where?!
7 comments • Posted in Expression
Am I L-deaf?
Folk! Do YOU pronounce the L in the word, FOLK? I know that dictionaries say “NO, we don’t”. But I think that I often hear an L there. Eh?
6 comments • Posted in Expression
