Make/take a left/right, etc.

[Laurence Horn]

At 11:03 AM -0400 10/2/02, sagehen wrote:
>  >I have both, and introspection fails about the selectivity device
>>selecting or preferring one or the other. (Good thing; otherwise us
>>quantitatively-oriented sociolinguists wouldn't have squat to do).
>>
>>dInIs
>~~~~~~
>I also have both, but feel that selection is a matter of register: depends
>on whom I'm talking to.  "Take" feels just slightly more hip; "make," more
>formal.  If giving directions to a stranger, might also say "make" to a
>woman, "take," to a man.
>A. Murie

Somehow this discussion of "make" vs. "take", combining with the
thread on Philly, reminds me of that great billboard you see coming
down on Amtrak from New York to Philadelphia just outside New
Jersey's Capital City, reading

TRENTON MAKES
THE WORLD TAKES

I've never been able to figure out if this is pride speaking, or a complaint.

Larry