Will in Austin, Texas, feels a little odd every time he uses the expression funnily enough. Although the phrase is grammatically correct, it still feels awkward to say. In part, that’s because the adjective funny ends in the letter Y, but surprisingly enough the adverbs sillily, jollily, uglily, and friendlily were formed the same way from silly, jolly, ugly, and friendly. Those adverbial forms aren’t at all that common today, but they’ve been around since the 16th century. Also, contrary to what sticklers might insist, using the word fun as an adjective is perfectly fine. This is part of a complete episode.
A Winter Dictionary (Bookshop|Amazon) by Paul Anthony Jones includes some words to lift your spirits. The verb whicken involves the lengthening of days in springtime, a variant of quicken, meaning “come to life.” Another word, breard, is...
Rosalind from Montgomery, Alabama, says her mother used to scold her for acting like a starnadle fool. The more common version of this term is starnated fool, a term that appears particular to Black English, and appears in the work of such writers...
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