finna

[Douglas G. Wilson]

>>"Fixing to" still looks like an expression of intentionality to me. "Fixing
>>to rain" = "getting prepared to rain" AFAIK. I hear sometimes -- and say
>>myself -- things like "It's planning to rain like crazy any minute" or
>>"It's not raining yet but it's been thinking about it all morning".
>The last one, though, is metaphorically interpreted, isn't it?  And
>possibly your penultimate example too?  As I understand "fixin to",
>any such intentionality has disappeared for many speakers (as noted
>above) ....

Yes, I'd say these are metaphors, and I'd say to me it's metaphoric with
"fixing to" just as with "planning to" or "getting ready to". My point was
only that use of such an expression as "It's fixing to rain" does not
require the speaker to have "fixing to" as a simple future. I myself would
not say for example "We don't know how the election will turn out, but it's
certain that one candidate is fixing to win and one is fixing to lose." Or
"Every man is fixing to make a fool of himself some day." These would seem
to me to show a complete loss of the intentionality (probably there are
much better examples), and I don't doubt somebody somewhere uses "fixing
to" this broadly although I can't say I recall encountering it myself.

-- Doug Wilson