[Ads-l] "Only?!"

[Wilson Gray]

Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU wrote
> I vote for irony.

Cf. the "ten o'clock scholar."

On Sat, Jan 3, 2015 at 10:59 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: "Only?!"
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I vote for irony.
>
> LH
>
> On Jan 3, 2015, at 6:08 PM, tajewell89 wrote:
>
> > Headline taken from LAist:
> >=20
> > "It only took nine months to finish a project that was supposed to =
> take five weeks: installing a gate."
> >=20
> > Isn't this use of "only" a bit backward? Or is there an ironic usage =
> here?
> >=20
> > -Tim J.
> >=20
> > Sent from my iPhone
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-- 
-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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