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>I know this is the right place to post this question!

"Hurry up and answer", Tom thought Swiftly. That's right, it's a Tom Swifty. a google search on this will turn up 100s of hits and I encourage the effort as these can entertain for... as long as it takes. for the googley impaired, here are a couple of links and a couple more examples:

http://www.mneta.org/~WMjglenn/SIMMSTomSwifties.html

http://www.floaty.com/~jonathan/library/jonathan/swifties

Let's go dig up some bodies, Tom said gravely.
I've struck oil, Tom said crudely.
Your hair is a complete mess, Tom teased.
I couldn't believe there were exactly 100 people there, Tom recounted.



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a versus an. The answer is simple. If you pronounce the h, use a, if you don't pronounce it use an. I remember reading somewhere (Fowler maybe?) that the h in historic didn't use to be pronounced by the "educated" but was pronounced by the "uneducated", and that's why the myth grew up that it should be an historic regardless of the fact that the "educated" pronunciation had changed.

Bingley


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stranger
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Given the news concerning the various chemical sprays, perhaps an apple is neither healthy nor healthful. The question may be more technical than semantic.


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old hand
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The sprays are applied to keep the apple healthy. Their effects on the consumer of the fruit have to be "within the limits of tolerance".


#264 06/21/00 02:17 PM
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Which is why the only person left saying "an historic" is the queen (and even she looks a little uncomfortable with it).


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>>"Hurry up and answer", Tom thought Swiftly. That's right, it's a Tom Swifty. a google search on this will turn up 100s of hits and I encourage the effort as these can entertain for... as long as it takes.<<
Tsuwm, you are really sharp, she said pointedly.




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Writerly1--
Whoa, your very first post!
I hope, based on your name, that we'll be seeing
a whole lot more from you.

(hint, hint, to all you FORMERLY
posting people who seem to have vanished!)



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>>The sprays are applied to keep the apple healthy. Their effects on the consumer of the fruit have to be "within the limits of tolerance".<<

Dr. Sieber,

If Writerly1 is from the U.S., that might explain the
concern. We had a nationwide scare about this a few years
ago. (Overblown by the media, in my opinion.)






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"Thank you for your delicious help, tsuwm," jackiemw replied tastefully. (Okay, so I don't have the hang of it yet, best I could come up with off the top of my head.) An honest-to-goodness thank you, though.

To others who replied, thanks for your posts. I should have made this a new topic, I guess, to avoid confusion. The healthy/healthful trivia question was answered a while ago. (Healthy relates to people; healthful to things.)


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In reply to:

Why is there such a tendancy to make a new longer word when a perfectly acceptable short word will do the job?


For the same reason as leads to finding such hitherto unknown distinctions as healthful v. healthy. TO MAKE YOURSELF LOOK MORE KNOWLEDGEABLE THAN OTHER PEOPLE

Bingley



Bingley
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