'looks like'

[Lynne Murphy]

A reader of my blog has sent me a query that's stumped me. Starting with an
example from _To kill a mockingbird_, he writes:

"Dill says of Boo Radley, musing on his reclusiveness, "Looks like he'd
stick his head out the door some time".  I *think* I've met this use (which
I can only make sense of by "translating" as "You'd think that...") a
handful of times since, ie over a period of getting on for 30 years
since I read the book, but I can't remember any specifics."

I agree that, in context, it looks like you have to read it as 'You'd think
he'd stick his head out', rather than 'It looks like he would stick his
head out sometimes', the context can be found at the bottom of page 12 on
this pdf version:

photo.goodreads.com/documents/1239291793books/2660.pdf

Is this a known use of 'looks like', or do we have to read the 'some time'
as 'sometimes' in spite of the contextual evidence?

Thanks in advance,
Lynne



Dr M Lynne Murphy
Senior Lecturer in Linguistics
Arts B357
University of Sussex
Brighton BN1 9QN

phone: +44-(0)1273-678844
http://separatedbyacommonlanguage.blogspot.com

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