Comments(1) If someone gets a chance to use this or anything like it, please do:
Why did analogy seem to immediately level away that particular sound change? Well, it’s hard to say…
Comments(3) Just finished watching today’s Jeopardy! Something Alex Trebek said at the very end puzzled me.
Going into Final Jeopardy, the third place contestant was basically out of the running. She got it wrong, and went down to near $0. Next up was the defending champion, who went in with around $8000. She too got the question wrong and dropped down to $6000. Then came the last contestant, who went in with (IIRC) $11500. He too got the question wrong, so it came down to his wager.
When it was revealed that his wager was (attempting to recall here…) $4999, Trebek said, “Not enough.”
My first reaction when he said that was, “huh?!” My next reaction was, “not enough to what?” Which, when answered, led me to wonder, “did he want the defending champion to win?” Because pretty much the only answer I can come up with to my first question is, “not enough to lose” (or maybe “not enough to let the defending champion win”). But to phrase it like that makes it seem like him losing is a goal that Trebek would like to see accomplished.
Comments(3) Consider (source):
McCain didn’t help his own cause by uttering the out of touch homily “the fundamentals of our economy remain strong” in the middle of the chaos.
Cursory examination of the Web-as-corpus (thanks, Google) tells me that not help (out) one’s (own) cause seems to be applicable in a reasonably wide range of contexts, though usually involving some sort of conflict, competition, or argumentation. But, without negation, what do you get? Well?
Comments(0) What associations do people have, I wonder, with the phrase help (out) one’s (own) cause? I have a rather particular one, which I’ll report on soon.