Greetings,

One area which causes a great deal of difficulty for some people is the confusion of verbs with other parts of speech - if you bare with me, I'll precede to advice you in the correct practise.

OK. Who spotted the errors there?

Right. These are just some of examples of the confusion that commonly occurs.

(...if you bear with me, I'll proceed to advise you on the correct practice.)

The first group below, are verbs that are frequently misused:

And so are these: PRACTISE - practice; ADVISE - advice; PROPHESY - prophecy

In the above examples, you'll notice that the verb takes S, while the noun has C. (An easy way to remember this is to associate the C in 'common noun' with the C in the nouns).

In American-English, both noun and verb are spelled PRACTICE.

LOSE - loose; RESENT - recent; WRITE - right; SOAR - sore; KNEW - new; TIED - tired

HEAR - here; ALLOWED - aloud; PASSED - past.

e.g. She passed the house on her morning walk past the beach.

NOT "Staff only passed this point" - you often see this one!

Last week's exercise:

Instead of a quiz this week, a word-building exercise (can't stop using those hyphens!).

Eliminate the word that doesn't belong:

1. intrepid, dauntless, craven, valiant

2. fretful, placid, petulant, peevish

3. circumspect, prudent, careless, judicious

4. lavish, profuse, stinted, abundant

5. hackneyed, trite, original, stereotyped

6. rabid, frantic, rational, frenetic

7. discordant, compatible, inconsistent, incongruous

8. ephemeral, transient, evanescent, enduring

9. garrulous, reserved, loquacious, verbose

10.disparage, deprecate, decry, commend

Remember how I keep saying that language is a living, growing entity - here are some wonderful new terms that I'm sure you'll be able to use (sent to me by Ed):

Blamestorming - Sitting around in a group, discussing why a deadline was
missed or a project failed, and who was responsible.

Seagull Manager - A manager who flies in, makes a lot of noise, craps
over everything and then leaves.

Chainsaw Consultant - An outside expert brought in to reduce the
employee head count, leaving the top brass with clean hands.

Idea Hamsters - People who always seem to have their idea generators
running.

Mouse Potato - The on-line, wired generation's answer to the couch
potato.

SITCOMs - What yuppies turn into when they have children and one of them
stops working to stay home with the kids. Stands for Single Income, Two
Children, Oppressive Mortgage.

Starter Marriage - A short-lived first marriage that ends in divorce
with no kids, no property and no regrets.

Stress Puppy - A person who seems to thrive on being stressed out and
whiny.

Swiped Out - An ATM or credit card that has been rendered useless
because the magnetic strip is worn away from extensive use.

Assmosis - The process by which some people seem to absorb success and
advancement by kissing up to the boss rather than working hard.

Irritainment - Entertainment and media spectacles that are annoying, but
you find yourself unable to stop watching them. The O.J. trials were a
prime example.

Uninstalled - Euphemism for being fired. Heard on the voicemail of a
vice president at a downsizing computer firm: "You have reached the
number of an uninstalled vice president. Please dial our main number and
ask the operator for assistance."

A Latin phrase for times when there's an embarrassing pause in the conversation:

(How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?)

Regards,

Jennifer

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