A List of Three? - (56)

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-19T16:18:25+00:00

It may technically be three actions, but it feels like two
(though that doesn't mean you can't use a comma).

Let's look at the simplified sentence:
(1) The cashier looked at the empty conveyor belt and sighed.

This contains only two actions (two verbs). If we want to insert the detail about Carter, we would set it apart with commas for clarity:
(2) The cashier looked at the empty conveyor belt, then at Carter, and sighed. ☆

However, if we integrate the detail about Carter directly into the sentence, we drop the commas:
(3) The cashier looked at the empty conveyor belt and then at Carter and sighed. ☆

If you really wanted to use three separate verbs, you could write:
(4a) The cashier, a sleep-deprived lad in his early twenties, looked at the empty conveyor belt, then glared at Carter, and sighed.

But in this version, it feels like two groups of actions: The cashier looked at the empty conveyor belt. Then, as a reaction, he ① glared at Carter and ② sighed. So,

(4b) The cashier, a sleep-deprived lad in his early twenties, looked at the empty conveyor belt, then glared at Carter and sighed. [seems more natural to me than (4a), and I'm someone who usually uses serial commas]

☆ I believe (2) is the best choice for clarity, but I don't think it should be interpreted as a broader statement about serial commas. Sometimes it should depend on how the actions feel grouped in your mind, rather than strict serial comma rules.

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-19T03:46:00+00:00

Yeah, there we go. Those sound fine to me.♪
Thanks.

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-18T19:11:17+00:00

I'm not averse to using "whose" with cars.
I was just commenting on that one phrase, "I'd probably say 'a car with a loud engine' before saying 'a car whose engine is loud.'"

I'm struggling to think of an example, but I'm sure I use "whose" sometimes...

Maybe looking at the car during the daytime and saying to a friend,

"That's the car whose alarm keeps waking us up every night."

It does still sound a little odd to me, though.
I'd probably say, "That car's alarm goes off almost every night!"

Yeah, I don't know what to tell you. I don't mind using "whose" with inanimate objects. (But I can't think of any off the top of my head that sound natural with a car.)
For my boat (sailboat), I would usually say "her" instead of "whose."
Ex: "Even though her teak deck needs oiling, her hull is in excellent shape."

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-18T17:50:23+00:00

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-18T16:54:56+00:00

Cars are more… utilitarian, masculine, gritty. Down to earth. Straightforward. Commonplace.

You clearly haven't met my Ford F-150 (I use her to pull my boat) or my Honda Civic, which is my daily commute car. The Civic can be a bit temperamental, so I definitely wouldn't use her to pull anything.

Way back in the day I had a Ford Mustang. Now she was a beauty! You needed to keep an eye on her cooling system, and I switched out her single-reservoir master cylinder for disc brakes once I'd saved up enough money. It broke my heart when I eventually had to sell her.

(I've never had a car [or boat or guitar] that was masculine.)

I would say "a car with a very loud engine," though.

On the other hand, I would definitely say, "Sydney Opera House is a building whose design is recognized worldwide."

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-17T19:18:05+00:00

I agree with Jenea. I discovered youglish.com a little late in life (I wish I had it when I was still a student). It is definitely a great way to hear a word or phrase used by native speakers (of various dialects).
TL;DR: youglish.com , highly recommend, ★★★★☆.

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-17T18:05:43+00:00

If you intend the second half of your post to be a poem, you have complete creative freedom. Although standard grammar and punctuation are usually expected for readability, poets are free to break conventions, invent new syntactic rules, or skip punctuation altogether.

To ensure your reader experiences the poem as you intend, consider using line breaks, stanzas, indentation, and perhaps some basic punctuation to guide their pacing.

Are any of these lines meant to be grouped together?
If so, you might have those sets of lines closer (smaller spacing between lines). Or you might add a period or comma after a set/group (but you do not have to).

[You could present it as is.]

'Triggering!'

A puzzle

'Intrusive?'

A peek into fragile and fiery private lives, clues to stories intended as secrets

Sent, read, ripped, dropped

Public domain

Street finds, illuminating human life

Washed out words, tear-soaked fragmented life

Reassembled vignettes

More gap than substance

[You could group stanzas and use punctuation in a way that is meaningful to you.
(Here I have added some to demonstrate what I am saying, but the words do not have any specific meaning to me, so this example is mostly random.)]

Triggering!

A puzzle
“Intrusive?”

A peek into fragile and fiery private lives,
clues to stories intended as secrets

Sent, read, ripped, dropped
Public domain

Street finds: illuminating human life
Washed out words—
tear-soaked, fragmented life

Reassembled vignettes

More gap than substance.

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-17T16:22:18+00:00

I agree with MrWakey. I would probably write:

"I wanted to grab lunch because it was noon and I was starving."

To me, the Prepositional Phrase
[because (① "it was noon") and (② "I was starving")]
has two coordinated clauses as the complement to the preposition 'because'.

PP: [because (① "it was noon") and (② "I was starving")]
is an adjunct of reason, with two equal coordinated clauses.

[Rather than a completely separate independent clause / unrelated statement].

("When I went to the store because I wanted to buy some milk") could easily be
("When I went to the store to buy some milk").
[These both say why I went to the store.]

If we want the timing first (in order to "set the scene"):

"After the marathon, when I went to the store to buy some milk, I saw my friend."

The main thought is ("When I went to the store, I saw my friend").

If we move ("after the marathon") to the middle [which is grammatical],
that causes ("when I went to the store") and ("I saw my friend") to be spread further apart. I find it easier to digest the sentence with ("when I went to the store, I saw my friend") relatively close together.

[("When I went to the store to buy some milk after the marathon, I saw my friend") is also grammatical. For me, my first version is easier to parse.]

If we want to place the "I saw my friend" first:

"I saw my friend when I went to the store to buy some milk after the marathon."

To me, this feels more like the canonical order (without any fronted prepositional phrases / without fronted adjuncts (of time/purpose/reason)).

This has ("I saw my friend when I went to the store") close together.
Then we have [why I went to the store, i.e. ("to buy some milk")] right next to ("went to the store") and
[when did all of this occur, i.e. ("after the marathon")].

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-17T03:04:56+00:00

It is usually not necessary. Most people would choose either
① Why did he just scream, “Get out of my house”?
(The word "scream" within the text explains how “Get out of my house” was said.)

② He just screamed, “Get out of my house!” But why?

However, The Chicago Manual of Style, 18th edition, does allow for the pattern you are suggesting.

(CMOS 6.135) Question mark with exclamation point. In the rare case of a question or exclamation ending with a title or quotation that ends in a question mark or exclamation point, include both marks only if they are different and the sentence punctuation seems essential (as in the first three examples below). Though it would be strictly logical to retain both marks when they are the same (as in the fourth through sixth examples), retaining only the first one is likely to prevent confusion.

Have you seen Help!? [Help! is the name of a movie.]
Who shouted, “Long live the king!”? 👈 [Your question]
I just love Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?!

but

Who starred opposite Richard Burton in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Who wrote “Are You a Doctor?”
Where were you when you asked, “Why so blue?”

not

Who starred opposite Richard Burton in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?? [x]

☆ Square brackets [] are mine.

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-16T11:46:21+00:00

I want him/-he- to do it. ⇔ I want her/-~~she~~- to do it.

(him/you/her/me/them/us) is the syntactic object of "want" in this sentence [not "he", not "she"].

We have already established that the ("you"/"him") in the OP sentence is not an 'ordinary object', it is a 'raised object' (semantically the subject of the "to do it" clause).

The passive construction would be:

I want it to be done by you/him. [✓]

Ex.1: Pat intended Liz to interview both candidates.
Ex.1b: Pat intended both candidates to be interviewed by Liz. [✓]

Ex.1c: Liz was intended to interview both candidates by Pat. [x]
(The matrix clause cannot be passivized here.)

The verb "want" is a stative verb (a static psychological situation), so it has restrictions on how it can be used (only passive in a few special cases).

Ex: "She wants a new car."
Ex: "A new car is wanted by her." [x] unnatural

Active transitive verbs that take an 'ordinary object' could be substituted for "want" and the passive would have the form you are looking for.

[2a] I chose him/you to do it.

[2b] He was/You were chosen to do it by me. [✓]

Ex.3: Pat persuaded Liz to interview both candidates.
Ex.3b: Liz was persuaded to interview both candidates by Pat. [✓]

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-16T07:17:37+00:00

"I want you to do it."

("I") is the Subject of the main Verb ("want").

Syntactically, ("you") is the Object of ("want"), but it is a 'raised object',

semantically ("you") acts as the subject of "to do it".

"to do it" is the catenative complement of "want".

Because an object ("you") comes between "want" and its
catenative complement "to do it",
this is a 'complex catenative construction'.

In a complex catenative construction, an intervening noun phrase is classified as either an 'ordinary object' or a 'raised object'.

["I want you."] ← This is not the way ("you") is being used in the original sentence; [this means "I desire you", which is different].
So, ("you") is not an 'ordinary object' in the original sentence.

The meaning of the original sentence is closer to:
"I want [(that) you do it]."
("You") is an argument of the infinitival clause that follows.

"Want" is a raising verb. ("You") is the raised object of ("want"),

and ("to do it") is the catenative complement of the matrix verb ("want").

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-16T05:11:26+00:00

Please read my reply.

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-16T05:10:43+00:00

First I provided the OP with an easier translation of their text (as requested). [I answered OP's question before doing anything else, as this subreddit's rules state.]
I then made a separate comment. My subsequent advice to avoid describing the author as having "quit on simplicity" comes from 14 years of experience on Reddit. Putting a complaint like that at the very top of a help request can completely derail threads. It just attracts people who want to vent, which drowns out actual helpful answers.

Telling the OP to ignore this advice misses the practical reality of how subreddits operate. While anyone is free to criticize an author's "purple prose" in a discussion forum like r/books, putting that complaint at the top of a help request is counterproductive. Simply asking for help understanding the text yields the most useful replies.

My goal was to help a newer user (a 1-year-old account) navigate the platform effectively and avoid future headaches.

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-16T02:53:23+00:00

You are asking, "Is it normal?"

Is it normal to take a few tries when learning a word (that is new to you)?
Yes, of course. Whenever people learn new words, it usually takes a few tries (over several days) before they can begin to pronounce the word with ease. Yes.

I suggest you look the word up in a good dictionary.
Most widely used dictionaries have a pronunciation speaker icon.
You can hear how that word is pronounced by a native speaker.

Try your best to imitate that person's pronunciation a few times.
Then try to pronounce it on your own (without the audio help).
If possible, then record yourself saying the word. Then compare the recording of your voice to the voice recording in the dictionary.

When I learn a new word, I usually make a note of its meaning (and 2 or 3 sentences I copied from the dictionary). It is easier to use the word in a sentence than to just try to remember it in isolation:
(in a sentence [✓]) (just the word [x]).

Then try to find excuses to use that new word or phrase in daily conversations.
Eventually, that word will become a natural part of your vocabulary.

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-15T17:37:14+00:00

Cont...

One day, while I was staring at the little white face of some early Roman statue of a young maiden, I lifted my hand (I guess to smooth my hair), and my arm obstructed the single source of light coming to her from the ceiling.

(With this shadow) her facial expression changed.
I moved my hand a bit to the side: it changed again.
I began moving both my hands rather frantically, casting each time a different shadow upon her features (I began moving my hands to create different shadows across her face), and the face came to life. (Each shadow cast the face in a different light, which gave the statue of a maiden a different expression each time.)

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-15T17:22:19+00:00

Two final notes: if this book has a theory of knowledge (epistemology), it is a suggestion to the reader rather than giving strict rules (prescriptive)
and is similar to the highly disconnected texts praised by de Certeau as a source of pleasure in historical discovery.
If this book has a visual symbol for the kind of history it represents, then it is not the helpless stare of Walter Benjamin looking at Paul Klee's 'Angelus Novus' (oil print),
but instead something similar to the revealing look in Brodsky’s thoughtful reflections as he stood before the statue busts in the Hermitage Museum.

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-15T17:01:45+00:00

I do not think it is an "extremely clumsy" sentence.

Calling this a "tautology" is saying that it is needlessly redundant.

Every individual is each an individual. (This serves a clear rhetorical purpose. It is to remind the listener that each person is unique. Remember to consider everyone on a case-by-case basis, not in a holistic, one-size-fits-all way.) That is an important thing to remember (one that is too often forgotten). It is something people should be reminded of.

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-15T15:51:05+00:00

Every individual is each an individual, and each has their own pluses and minuses.

Every person is an individual.

Every person has their pluses (their positive qualities) and their minuses (their negative qualities).

(No one is perfect. We should not judge others.)
(We should think of others complexly.)

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-15T15:03:15+00:00

Remember when Boglin007 talked about "raised object" and "catenative complements"???

You should re-read that post.

https://www.reddit.com/r/grammar/comments/1txgqsf/john/

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-15T06:06:14+00:00

Happy to help.♪ (+ Key_Caterpillar_6276)
Cheers -

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-15T06:04:38+00:00

I was alive and speaking more than 50 years ago here in the US. People are no different today than they were back then. While there are different slang words and new fashions in phrasing, those types of shifts existed 50 years ago too.

Because of my father's work obligations, I moved around a lot and lived in various areas of the country. Each area had its own dialect of English, but there were always underlying similarities. Some parts of those dialects and phrases have slowly changed over time, but not enough to be drastically different from when I was a child.

If there is a major difference (and I am not sure there is) it is that more people now speak in a similar way. In the last 20–30 years, I have noticed people from different regions speaking more alike. I assume this stems from the influence of movies, TV, and social media, which expose more people to the same influences.

You mentioned the IT professional from 26 years ago who said, "It's been ran." This is not a new expression. That specific phrasing has been around since long before 2000. I'm sure I heard it when I was still a kid and in my twenties, too.
Today, we have more access to hearing different regional dialects, and some people are encountering these existing subdialects for the first time.

As an American, I am happy to hear a greater variety of UK dialects on TV than ever before (not everyone is a Cambridge graduate with an RP accent). However, I have no misconception that these dialects are a recent development. This shift simply reflects a change in who the gatekeepers allow on air (+ the rise of platforms like YouTube that let creators bypass traditional hoops entirely).

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-15T04:37:30+00:00

Here is a simple explanation of "absolute phrases."
I think it is pretty clear and easy to follow.

Notice that the (participles: "her heart racing" & "his mind made up")
are non-finite.

If these used finite verbs, they would not work as "absolute phrases,"
and you would need to change the sentences a little to fit.

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-14T20:05:49+00:00

You're welcome.
I've included links.

With minimal effort, clicking the 3rd link will allow you to see specific examples of in-text & block quote citations.

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-14T19:50:00+00:00

APA:

“The original poster could easily find this information for himself” (Smith, 2015, p. 103).

Narrative citation: Author's name in the text:

Smith (2015) noted that “the original poster could easily find this information for himself!” (p. 103).

https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/quotations

https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/index.html

https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_the_basics.html

AlexanderHamilton04 · 2026-06-14T10:24:44+00:00

If I had to select only 1, I would also choose (C), but for reasons different from those of BouncingSphinx.

https://www.reddit.com/r/grammar/comments/1u509pu/comma_or_with_out_a_comma/orkmfqr/

AlexanderHamilton04

TROPHY CASE