It's "bald-faced liar", not "bold-faced liar."

[Anonymous]

8:43 Actually, it means both.

Idioms & Phrases
moot point

A debatable question, an issue open to argument; also, an irrelevant question, a matter of no importance. For example, Whether Shakespeare actually wrote the poem remains a moot point among critics , or It's a moot point whether the chicken or the egg came first . This term originated in British law where it described a point for discussion in a moot , or assembly, of law students. By the early 1700s it was being used more loosely in the present sense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Which reminds me: voila, not walla.

Seriously? Walla?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Groton: in Connecticut, it rhymes with cotton.
Groton: in England, it sounds like grow-ton.

Thames River: in Connecticut, pronounced with the 'Th' like 'this'.
Thames River: in England, pronounced with the 'Th' like 'tea'.

Just so ya know. 8)

Yeah...what's the problem in CT? Berlin, CT has the accent on the first syllable. (Actually, I think that was originally a WWII thing.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:8:43 Actually, it means both.

Idioms & Phrases
moot point

A debatable question, an issue open to argument; also, an irrelevant question, a matter of no importance. For example, Whether Shakespeare actually wrote the poem remains a moot point among critics , or It's a moot point whether the chicken or the egg came first . This term originated in British law where it described a point for discussion in a moot , or assembly, of law students. By the early 1700s it was being used more loosely in the present sense.

Strange - I've never heard that first meaning used. It has a specific meaning in law - essentially, "no longer in dispute" - and I've always heard it used in other contexts with roughly that same definition.

I've always assumed that it was taken from law. I guess it probably started as "debatable," then developed a connotation of "academic," then was picked up in law to refer to an issue that has become academic or irrelevant.

[Anonymous]

Enervated means DRAINED of energy. Not full of it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:On a tangential note, there are a words and phrases that I didn't know how to pronounce properly until I was in college because I'd only read them and never heard them spoken. I'm not sure if this is a more or less embarrassing problem than then menage a trois mistake, but it was most common with place names that were (the classic examples being, of course, Greenwich Village and Worcester, Mass.).

My own mother laughed out loud at me when I (a bookworm from early on) pronounced it EP-uh-tome. I had never made the connection between epitome, and what I heard pronounced as epIDommy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are not in France. The proper pronunciation of L'Enfant in L'Enfant Plaza is "lon-font." I have never heard someone say "lan-fan" and I'm glad I've now been informed that some do because otherwise I would have been in serious danger of laughing in their face, particularly if they used a "correct" French accent.

Um, yes. This is what the person who answered the question said: laHn-faHn, which (for most US speakers) shares a phoneme with lOn-fOn. While we love grammar, we don't love looking up HTML codes. So you have to read carefully.

[Anonymous]

I also learned moot point as a legal term for a settled issue that is no longer open for review and assumed it had migrated to casual usage.

[Anonymous]

Someone can be empathic, not empathetic

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:On a tangential note, there are a words and phrases that I didn't know how to pronounce properly until I was in college because I'd only read them and never heard them spoken. I'm not sure if this is a more or less embarrassing problem than then menage a trois mistake, but it was most common with place names that were (the classic examples being, of course, Greenwich Village and Worcester, Mass.).

Good lord, I really was exhausted last night: it should read "that were unfamiliar."

Doesn't it warm your hearts to see that we also compulsively correct our own posts, anti-grammarians?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You TAKE someone to the doctor, you don't BRING them, unless you are at the dr when you are speaking.

What the what? How do you get through your days being so nitpicking?

Agreed. And I may throw in some misspellings and improper grammar just to make heads spin.

I love people that defend bad grammar and usage. They have no idea how stupid and uneducated they sound.

I wasn't defending bad grammar. I do read on a daily basis and spend my evenings correcting my kid's homework and pronunciation. I don't correct misspellings or grammar made by anonymous posters on a mommy forum, that doesn't make me stupid or uneducated.

Often times the grammar teachers go over the top on the forums, especially when grammar is used as retaliation for not agreeing with the opinion of the previous poster, making you equally child-like and immature. If you want to rid the world of improper usage, again, you should have become an actual teacher or editor. You pointing out misspellings does not changing anything.

[Anonymous]

Is it really bald-faced liar?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Someone can be empathic, not empathetic

Both are correct.

But there is the "new age" definition of an empath. Is that to which you are referring?

[Anonymous]

I know it's not an error, but "recapitulate" is a stupid word. "Capitulate" means to surrender, so why should "recapitulate" mean "sum up"? Just say "summarize."

[Anonymous]

Have we already addresses "well" versus "good"? As in: He did good on the test. Aaaaghhhh.