all of the sudden, one at the time, still in the bed

[Wilson Gray]

FWIW, I have no trouble with "still in the bed" and "a _pair_ of
scissors / pliers / shears," etc. "All of the sudden" and "one at the
time" are ungrammatical. "A scissors" is kinda okay because I've
become accustomed to hearing and reading it, though I would never use
it myself.

-Wilson

On 9/6/06, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: all of the sudden, one at the time, still in the bed
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> At 11:41 AM -0700 9/6/06, Arnold M. Zwicky wrote:
> >>--and no
> >>doubt very much like the effect of my "stand on line" to many non-New
> >>Yorkers.
> >
> >yes, you get that "Martian! Martian!" look.
> >
> >my pennsylvania-dutchism "a scissors" provokes a similar response.
> >
> Really?  I'm surprised--I'm sure I've encountered "a scissors" all my
> life, I assume because it's so much more natural and economical than
> "a pair of scissors" (although that can't be the whole story, since I
> don't recall encountering "a pants"), while "stand on line" (vs. in
> line) or "all of the sudden" (vs. a sudden) involve a totally
> arbitrary choice as far as I can tell; at least the regionally
> restricted forms don't appear to be more logical than the more widely
> distributed variants in those cases.
>
> LH
>
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>


--
-Wilson
----
Everybody says, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange
complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.

--Sam Clemens

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