Strange Conversations: Part One Hundred and Forty-One
Posted 24 May 2009 in Strange Conversations by Catriona
The first object lesson to be taken from this post is never blog when you’re tipsy.
ME: I’m bringing my computer out to the living room, because I secretly like to tweet Rage.
NICK: Me, too!
ME: That’s how we know we’re the perfect couple.
NICK: Really?
ME: No, not really.
NICK: Pardon?
ME: Well, I secretly don’t like you very much.
NICK: I’m making you coffee, if that makes a difference.
ME: No, not so much.
NICK: I thought as much.
ME: Then why make me coffee, if you didn’t think it made a difference?
NICK: Treena, everyone needs their own form of incentivisation.
The second object lesson is never enter into an argument with a man who is so steeped in bureaucratese that he can not only make nouns from verbs (as we all can) but can actually make nouns from other nouns.
Share your thoughts [4]
1
Tim wrote at May 24, 10:30 am
He’s a nominaliser?
And:
> Well, I secretly don’t like you very much.
Not much of a secret, now that it’s on your blog! :p
2
Catriona wrote at May 24, 10:37 am
> He’s a nominaliser?
Well, I was uncertain as to whether to call that a nominalisation. I tell my students that nominalising is turning a verb into a noun—seems as though there should be another word for turning a noun into another noun.
> Not much of a secret, now that it’s on your blog! :p
What about if I assume a small number of readers? Then it’s kind of a secret!
3
Tim wrote at May 24, 01:25 pm
The root noun was verbified (<smirk>) before Nick nominalised it.
> What about if I assume a small number of readers? Then it’s kind of a secret!
Less of a secret than it was before, though!
4
Catriona wrote at May 24, 01:38 pm
I don’t think I’ve ever used the word “incentivised” in a sentence—but then I don’t work for the government (except in a broader sense), so that would probably explain it.
The fact that a perfectly good noun can become another noun by way of a verb is an indictment of modern society, I feel!
And to think Nero Wolfe used to throw people out of his office for using “contact” as a verb . . .
(Which brings me to a sentence I should really use more often, from Stout’s 1952 novel Murder By The Book: “‘Bore’ is an active verb. I am merely indifferent.” Bless you, Nero.)