Posted on 08/29/2007 5:50:29 PM PDT by MrsEmmaPeel
I was in a *boring* meeting, absentmindedly doodling on a scratch pad. I was pretty amazed after the meeting when I noticed that I doodled the following:
After the meeting, I glanced at my notes and have a serious question: is these appropriate in this context? I mean, should the correct grammar be: "I so enjoy discussions like this", she said wielding a bloody axe in her hand. I mean, isn't discussions a collective and therefore implies a singular?
Please set me straight. I am longing for instruction.
Dunno, but you are in good company.
Thank you, madam.
Regrettably, that is NOT Cornelius Fudge, but rather John Steed, the more dashing half of the Avengers.
Always?
I have to admit my scribblings surprised even me.
I learned that, too, but I guess I’m getting flaky in my middle age. I almost colored my hair “Kamikaze Raspberry” on Monday night, when I was doing my daughters. (The daughter who’s learning to drive from Pope Pius XII ...)
There are a few exceptions, always are.
I almost flunked grammer in school, couldn’t diagram a sentence. I knew a good sentence when I saw one, but just couldn’t diagram it :>)
Who’s the actor? It sure looks like Cornelius Fudge, and his earlier role, Siegfried Farnon.
The Pope does lessons?
I think it depends on whether you are currently hearing multiple discussions. If there is more than one discussion taking place during your meeting, then the current discussions to which you refer is what is implied. However if the current meeting only includes one discussion, then the implied object is singular.
My two cents.
I have to admit my scribblings surprised even me.
It is interesting what ones subconscious can conjure up when the walls of our consciousnesses are let down.
Only at night. He’s not licensed to drive in North Carolina.
Word of caution to the grammar police: she has a bloody axe in her hand.
I’m not as concerned with the grammar as I am with the meetings you’re going to and what you consider “boring.” Do you have your company picnics at Camp Crystal Lake?
I simply don’t understand why I doodled in bad grammar.
I almost flunked grammer in school, couldnt diagram a sentence.
Please, I beg you, never mention diagramming sentences to me again. My weak spot. I can do it, but only after nearly blowing my brain pan from the strain of it. lol
That would be Patrick Macnee, who played opposite Bond girls Dianna Rigg and Honor Blackman, starred in “This Is Spinal Tap”, and a host of films.
Not Fudge and Siegfried, then. Same nose, though.
“I mean, isn’t discussions a collective and therefore implies a singular?”
According to The Elements of Grammar, by Margaret Shertzer, collective nouns as subjects “may be regarded as singular or plural: singular, if the word denotes a group acting as an individual; plural, if the word denotes the individuals that make up the group.”
I vote for these...
Another thing... the last time I had a grammer test was about 36 years ago.
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