What are some common mistakes in grammar and brewing?

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Here's another irritating mistake "once and a while".
 
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Evo said:
Here's another irritating mistake "once and a while".

That's OK, now in then.
 
lisab said:
That's OK, now in then.
:smile:

I know you didn't half to post that, but if you hadn't of, I wouldn't of rofled.
 
Jimmy Snyder said:
My wife refuses to believe that a couple means two. When she says a couple, she means a few. The problem is that when she came to the states she already spoke Chinese and Japanese. We were never able to find a school that teaches English as a third language.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/couple :
Usage note
The phrase a couple of, meaning “a small number of; a few; several,” has been in standard use for centuries, especially with measurements of time and distance and in referring to amounts of money: They walked a couple of miles in silence. Repairs will probably cost a couple of hundred dollars. The phrase is used in all but the most formal speech and writing.
 
atyy said:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/couple :
Usage note
The phrase a couple of, meaning “a small number of; a few; several,” has been in standard use for centuries, especially with measurements of time and distance and in referring to amounts of money: They walked a couple of miles in silence. Repairs will probably cost a couple of hundred dollars. The phrase is used in all but the most formal speech and writing.
But if "couple" means "few or several", then what do "few or several" mean?

What you posted is listed as an idiom, not a definition.
 
Evo said:
But if "couple" means "few or several", then what do "few or several" mean?

What you posted is listed as an idiom, not a definition.

A couple is a small few. A few is a bit more than a couple. Several is a few couples. Duh.
 
Officer, I only had a couple of drinks. couple = 10 or more
 
Evo said:
Officer, I only had a couple of drinks. couple = 10 or more

That's a drinkers dozen.
 
Drakkith said:
That's a drinkers dozen.

See... I want to "like" this.

Anyway, If I wanted to say "two" I'd say two. If I want to use some vague sounding English word that sort of implies two, I'll say "a couple". But that doesn't necessarily mean two exactly...
 
Evo said:
:smile:

I know you didn't half to post that, but if you hadn't of, I wouldn't of rofled.
I'd'ven't either.
 
Evo said:
Officer, I only had a couple of drinks. couple = 10 or more

I can't get "couple" to equal anything but 2 in my brain.

"A couple walks into a bar" ...now how many of you pictured a crowd coming through the door?
 
I cringe when I see the word "loose" substituted for "lose", mostly because I see it so often these days. Did you loose your wallet? You exited the casino a looser?
 
There all kinds of colloquial redundancies in US English. One that gets me is "tuna fish". We already know that tuna is a fish. Are you going to make a salad with canned tuna for sandwiches or do we have tuna steaks that I can grill? "Fish" is not a logical modifier.
 
Last edited:
We say "tuna fish" to distinguish it from "tuna piano." :wink:
 
turbo said:
There all kinds of colloquial redundancies in US English. One that gets me is "tuna fish". We already know that tuna is a fish. Are you going to make a salad with canned tuna for sandwiches or do we have tuna steaks that I can grill? "Fish" is not a logical modifier.

I had chicken bird enchiladas for lunch.
 
And then there are those classics of financial lingo, "PIN number" and "ATM machine."

Or do they call bank tellers "ATM persons" nowadays? It's been a long time since I actually went inside a bank.
 
'Reminds me of this:

Words for Small Sets
words_for_small_sets.png

[Source: http://xkcd.com/1070/]
 
Evo said:
People constantly write and say reoccur when they mean recur. When something happens repeatedly it recurs, as in recurring rates.

Well, if it keeps happening then it certainly is a recurring problem.
 
The word free in advertising is notorious. Free house with purchase of kitten.
 
lisab said:
I had chicken bird enchiladas for lunch.

Ah, how is she? :rolleyes:
 
I just experienced a new one, I think.

A news blurb talking about some local sampling of "Artesian Beer."

I'm fairly certain they meant "Artisan Beer" as in "Craft Beer." I don't think they meant that folks were going out of their way to make beer with waters from artesian aquifers. Or were they?
 
Chi Meson said:
I just experienced a new one, I think.

A news blurb talking about some local sampling of "Artesian Beer."

I'm fairly certain they meant "Artisan Beer" as in "Craft Beer." I don't think they meant that folks were going out of their way to make beer with waters from artesian aquifers. Or were they?
Lol!
 
Chi Meson said:
I don't think they meant that folks were going out of their way to make beer with waters from artesian aquifers. Or were they?

That's exactly the reason why Burton on Trent became the "Brewing Capital" of the UK. There is a continuous hiistorical record of brewing there for more than 1000 years. At its peak about 50% of the working population was employed in the industry and it produced about 25% of all the beer consumed in the UK.

Typical Burton water analysis, if you want to try reproducing it:
800 ppm sulphates
300 ppm calcium
200 ppm carbonates
35 ppm chlorides
25 ppm magnesium
25 ppm sodium
There should be some taste and smell of sulphur in the end product.