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#155588 02/16/06 02:07 PM
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a bit different from what happens in conversation all the time

Cuz, online, there's a delusion that the person at your keyboard is in control. I've never been on a forum / email list where threads didn't go off topic, ever.


Ceci n'est pas un seing.
#155589 02/16/06 07:52 PM
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I
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Forums seek their topic.

#155590 02/16/06 08:45 PM
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Quote:

Forums seek their topic.




Yeah, thanks, Bishop Berkeley!

#155591 02/16/06 09:19 PM
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Fr Steve, I want to make it clear that I'm not kvetching; I think it's quite normal that threads should digress! Just sayin' that this one takes the cake -- maybe because there were so many parts of it I was interested in and had commments for that I became easily confused.

#155592 02/16/06 09:58 PM
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Unraveling:

Is that when you listen to oreloB?

Actually, I was just thinking about that pair of words the other night and wondering if there were similar words which had the appearance of being opposite one another but were actually synonyms, or if ravel/unravel is unique.

I know, I know. It's probably a YART, but there's also new people who may not have been privy to any such conversation.

Lastly, is there a term for such pairs of words?

But I digress.


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1. synonyms for future reference: swerve, depart, deviate, digress, diverge, stray, veer - These verbs mean to turn away from a straight or prescribed course: a gaze that never swerved; won't depart from family traditions; deviated from the original plan; digressed from the main topic; opinions that diverged; strays from the truth; a conversation that veered away from sensitive issues. [AHD]

2. pairwise(!?) words
ravel : unravel
flammable : inflammable
regardless : irregardless
loosen : unloosen

generally, affixing in- or un- or dis- in the completely sense makes them stronger than the original; e.g., annul and disannul.

Last edited by tsuwm; 02/16/06 11:01 PM.
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If you say that something is not an option it means you can't take it, If you say it's not optional it means you must.

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Shame on you Faldage, you play.

The isolated term "not-optional" has no negative relationship to the sentence construction..."that is not an option".

Mind your semantics. We have people here who think you are the Queen (so to speak) of the King's English).

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..but one does run out of room in the subject box. and besides, who amongst us doesn't irregularly read the subject?!

BTW, I should have noted that the *original sense of unravel was disentangle.

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Actually, I would say loosen, flammable, and regardless, but for some unknown reason I would use unravel and not ravel. Even though the bard used ravel IIRC. I can't hink of a situation where I would use unloosen, inflamabble, or (especially) irregardless, the latter being a word that always stimulates my gag reflex.


TEd
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