Bassie: You know what’s been bothering me lately?
Me: What?
Bassie: If someone says “it’s cold outside”, you can’t respond by saying “It’s”.
Pause…me thinking…
Me: You’re right, you can’t. And if I ask you “have you done your homework?”, you can’t respond by saying “I’ve”.
Pause…her thinking…
Bassie: No, you can’t.
Me: That’s weird. Because those are both technically sentences with subjects and predicates.
Bassie: Yeah, but you can’t say them.
Me: No, no you can’t.
Silence.
Me: Hunh.
Bassie: Weird.
2 Comments
That’s what ’tis is for.
This reminds me of a similar conversation I had with my two youngest daughters about using the phrase “isn’t it?” which literally means “is not it.” After my long-winded lecture on the interrogative forms of negative direct object clauses, my youngest daughter said….
“So, its is it not not is not it?”
to which I immediately replied:
“Precisely…..”
and everyone else at our table started laughing. That phrase “is it not not is not it” was given a coveted position on the front of the fridge and has since become a part of our secret family lexicon.
Post a Comment