abide = 'abate'

[Jonathan Lighter]

But "non-native" in this case almost doesn't count: she's obviously
very fluent in English. She wrote a dissertation in English at
Utrecht.

Now, if it were question of weird syntax, that would be different.

(Unless it were weird enough to be funny.)

JL

On Sun, Feb 19, 2012 at 7:56 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: abide = 'abate'
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Sun, Feb 19, 2012 at 6:47 PM, Jonathan Lighter
> <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Laura Slot appears to be a native speaker of Dutch, so it may just be
>> a slip. Â But it's interesting nonetheless.
>
> Thanks for opening the door, John! I've come across numerous of <har!
> har!> examples that I haven't posted because the writers, upon closer
> inspection, have turned out not to be native-speakers.
>
> Or should that be, "have not turned out to be native-speakers"? Or
> "have turned out to not be native-speakers"? Or "have turned out to be
> not natives speakers"?
>
> Meh. What does it matter? The meaning - the only matter of consequence
> - is clear, in every case. All else is style.
>
> --
> -Wilson
> -----
> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
> to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> -Mark Twain
>
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