Proofreading Service - Pain in the English
Proofreading Service - Pain in the English

Your Pain Is Our Pleasure

24-Hour Proofreading Service—We proofread your Google Docs or Microsoft Word files. We hate grammatical errors with a passion. Learn More

Proofreading Service - Pain in the English
Proofreading Service - Pain in the English

Your Pain Is Our Pleasure

24-Hour Proofreading Service—We proofread your Google Docs or Microsoft Word files. We hate grammatical errors with a passion. Learn More

Username

goossun

Member Since

February 12, 2004

Total number of comments

86

Total number of votes received

110

Bio

Latest Comments

“I says”

  • September 12, 2004, 10:06am

According to David, isn't it more common to refer to oneself as third-person in England than in the US?
i.e. Hamlet page one:
"Ferancisco: Bernardo?
Bernardo: He."
I've got an English friend who never asks, "How are you?" He always says, "How's Goossun?" while directly addressing me. To my knowledge one hears this kind of speech more from English than Americans. Am I right?

ab

  • September 12, 2004, 9:51am

OK Speedwell, in that case if I were a doctor I would rather be an "abuser" than a "misuser!"

Any comment on Belinda's "about?"

“Can I get” vs. “May I have”

  • August 27, 2004, 5:09pm

I think that has a lot to do with whereabout you are. I am always afraid of speaking to elderly native English speaking people since the way we speak English here in Denmark may sound totally vulgar.
Also I have for instance learned something, let say, from an Irish and then that wasn't quite understood the same way when I said it to an American.

ab

  • August 27, 2004, 4:57pm

Oh yeah, "abuse" why did it skip my mind? "Mr. Speedwell" got my question quite write. I was looking for the words that could get "ab" as prefix. Use-abuse, normal-abnormal etc. no matter what the root is. I was just wondering if a "rule" could be applied for it. (ex. if we could negate our friend Abbie with an ab prefix or he is already negated and if he turns out [HIV] positive then we can just call him Bie!)

But a new thing, I always thought that misuse and abuse meant two different things, don't they? I thought that misuse is like you have too much money and you couldn’t use it proper whereas abuse is like you abuse my credit card. (I just had my credit cared stolen and I got the new one today. There is a little text that reads "Misuse is a criminal offence" and I was thinking it should've been abuse instead of misuse. I was actually wondering if it wasn’t a Danglish thing.) Huh? What you think?

ab

  • August 26, 2004, 5:15pm

Abbie, we are just a bunch of dumb-ass red-necks, we have never saw a book in our lives. You should consider the fact that not everyone is as smart as you are.

Does anyone have a comment on Jutta's. Is "absent" a right example?

“Zen” as an Adjective

  • August 26, 2004, 5:38am

I had a problem to find a word (an adjective) which meant "related to or derived from Zen" when I was writing an article about a Japanese performance. I searched to see what adjective I can find. I didn't find any. There however were things like "Zen-based-arts" etc. So I thought to myself there is not an adjective for it in English.

...t you

  • August 13, 2004, 4:21am

I'm sexist! Sexi[e]st, sexy st. or/and St. Sexy!
However does S EXIST? S: "X is T."
(Here S stands for Socrates; don't mix up with Samuel Beckett or Saddam)
Yeah, SEX is TEA.

Pawshop

  • August 6, 2004, 8:43am

I just did not know that this kinda trade still exists. I guess I'm being too inosent!

I was reading the translation of Wim Wenders' The Act of Seeing and there the translator had a footnote that ended thus: ...(Trans.).
I guess that publishers use different system of punctuation. The above-mentioned book is Faber&Faber's and their stuff is very different that, say, Routledge.
However the same subject's been also discussed at:
http://www.painintheenglish.com/post.asp?id=180

Example

  • July 23, 2004, 8:19pm

OK. Webster online says "A verbal or acted enigma based upon a word which has two or more significant syllables or parts, each of which, as well as the word itself, is to be guessed from the descriptions or representations."
So I did not have any example to see what it could really be like.
http://www.webster-dictionary.org/definition/charade

Questions

People(s) February 10, 2004
Gerund and Present Participle February 12, 2004
Pronounciation of TH+S February 16, 2004
Weird name February 16, 2004
Any reference? February 17, 2004
un/ir February 17, 2004
Have/halve February 18, 2004
More than a pain in the English! February 26, 2004
00′s March 3, 2004
- March 25, 2004
S April 14, 2004
Term April 14, 2004
114 April 19, 2004
Who’s this Joe? April 19, 2004
Following the Joe April 23, 2004
English schools April 26, 2004
Gerontophile? April 28, 2004
Semtex April 29, 2004
Isn’t it odd? May 6, 2004
ir May 9, 2004
G-string May 9, 2004
Be-martyred May 10, 2004
Oral vs. Aural May 11, 2004
ta-ta & ho-ho May 15, 2004
Para June 1, 2004
Am I L-deaf? June 9, 2004
Punctuation June 13, 2004
P & K June 15, 2004
...t you June 18, 2004
F word June 18, 2004
negating June 21, 2004
The June 22, 2004
Pawshop July 2, 2004
Lacking Smell July 2, 2004
At or in July 8, 2004
Y2K July 12, 2004
Example July 23, 2004
Looking for a word July 29, 2004
OK July 29, 2004
ab August 26, 2004
Mixing October 1, 2004
Fuff October 1, 2004
V-cards November 1, 2004
Bios December 6, 2004
Hairy December 11, 2004
Ya’ese December 11, 2004
BCC December 12, 2004
Films December 26, 2004
all December 31, 2004
Credit card January 6, 2005
B4 Dickens January 14, 2005
L January 30, 2005
Joke June 19, 2005
Dick & Bob July 26, 2007
Frowing October 12, 2007
Head shot October 19, 2007