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you mean a noun can't act as an adjective?
and milo, just go sing the blues, arright?
;¬ )
formerly known as etaoin...
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you mean a noun can't act as an adjective?
I've got no problem with nouns acting like verbs etc., but (I was just trying to point out that) in this case, toy is acting poorly.
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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I've got no problem with nouns acting like verbs
To get the complete lesson: What is a noun acting like a verb?
Wood? like : a wooden frame? Or stone? A stone wall?
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nouns acting like verbs:
(old, accepted) I'll phone you tomorrow.
(new, derided) I'm going to office in the new quarters.
-joe (verbing weirds language) friday
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Yes , the second one is clearly unclear.
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in this case, toy is acting poorly. agreed! as for the rest of it, my head hurts from it being gone over. 
formerly known as etaoin...
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...So, because toy is modifying court doesn't mean, to me, that it is an adjective, but that it is a noun modifying another noun. We have plenty of compounds made up of two or more nouns. Would you say that in the phrase ancient history teacher that ancient history is an adjective? (Leaving aside the old joke of whether it's a history teacher who is ancient or a teacher of ancient history, but not a history teacher of ancient or a teacher who is ancient history.) Calling toy in this case complicates things syntactically because then you have to have two (or more) classes of adjective: some that act like normal adjectives. Yes. From the book INVENTING LANGUAGE - Seth Lerer Chapter One: Caedmon Learns to Sing the Blues[ Now we should praise heaven-kingdom Guardian, the Creater's might, and his mind-thought, the words of the Glory-father: how he, each of his wonders, the eternal Lord, established at the begining. He first shaped for earth's Children heaven as a roof, the holy Creator. Then a middle-yard, mankind's Guardian, the eternal Lord, established afterwards, the earth for the people, the Lord almighty.] ________________ xxxxx ____________________ This poem is the earliest recorded poem in the English Language. It survives in Old English as a marginal notation in the book HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH CHURCH AND PEOPLE written in Latin by an English monk and historian named Bede. The poem predates Bede's book which was written in the first third of the eighth century. Caedmon's hymn nouned nouns and compounded nouns back then. It is time for those with simple ears to get used to it. 
Last edited by themilum; 01/12/08 12:19 AM.
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Interesting how Caedmon composed that hymn. He was drinking with a bunch of his buddies and they were passing the harp around, composing on the fly. When the harp came to him he passed, saying that he never could versify. He left and went out into the alley to drink alone when an angel came to him and said, "Sure, you can do it. Just give it a try." So he went back in, grabbed the harp and came up with this: Nu sculon herigean heofonrices weard,
meotodes meahte and his modgeþanc,
weorc wuldorfæder, swa he wundra gehwæs,
ece drihten, or onstealde.
He ærest sceop eorðan bearnum
heofon to hrofe, halig scyppend;
þa middangeard moncynnes weard,
ece drihten, æfter teode
firum foldan, frea ælmihtig.
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The neat thing about Cædmon's poem is (like most Old English verse) it doesn't rhyme, nor does it scan in the stressed syllable sense of the word in later English verse. The lines are of various lengths. (A limerick, it ain't.)
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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(old, accepted) I'll phone you tomorrow.
(new, derided) I'm going to office in the new quarters.
Yes, (Nuncle's Lemma) anything that predates the grammar schooling of the ranting grammarian is A-OK, anything after secondary school is an abomination.
Tomorrow, like home or the cardinal compass points, is an interesting case.
1. I went home.
2. I went to John's home.
3. *I went John's home.
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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