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#31
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Halloween candy
On 2005-11-18, Hillary Israeli wrote:
In , dragonlady wrote: *No -- actually, I think it's pretty funny that I'd never tasted lox *until after I left home, and just assumed my mother didn't even know *what they were, and that I would be able to introduce HER to them. I didn't say anything about this when I saw it in the other post but... erm... isn't "lox" singular?? I believe that "lox" is an uncountable noun in English (like "bread"), which makes it grammatically singular for verbs, but you can't use the indefinite article "a". Lox is good. *I ate a lox. *I ate three lox. (* indicates ungrammatical sentences.) ------------------------------------------------------------ Kevin Karplus http://www.soe.ucsc.edu/~karplus Professor of Biomolecular Engineering, University of California, Santa Cruz Undergraduate and Graduate Director, Bioinformatics (Senior member, IEEE) (Board of Directors, ISCB) life member (LAB, Adventure Cycling, American Youth Hostels) Effective Cycling Instructor #218-ck (lapsed) Affiliations for identification only. |
#32
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Halloween candy
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#33
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Halloween candy
In article ,
Kevin Karplus wrote: On 2005-11-18, Hillary Israeli wrote: In , dragonlady wrote: *No -- actually, I think it's pretty funny that I'd never tasted lox *until after I left home, and just assumed my mother didn't even know *what they were, and that I would be able to introduce HER to them. I didn't say anything about this when I saw it in the other post but... erm... isn't "lox" singular?? I believe that "lox" is an uncountable noun in English (like "bread"), which makes it grammatically singular for verbs, but you can't use the indefinite article "a". Lox is good. *I ate a lox. *I ate three lox. I'm not sure bread is a good example -- you CAN say "They served three different breads with dinner." So if they were seving more than one kind of lox, what would the sentence be? -- Children won't care how much you know until they know how much you care |
#34
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Halloween candy
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#35
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Halloween candy
In ,
dragonlady wrote: *So if they were seving more than one kind of lox, what would the *sentence be? Well, I was just at a parent potluck dinner for my son's preK class, and someone brought 3 kinds of lox to the party - so I would say we had 3 kinds of lox! I would never say we had "3 lox" or "3 loxes," though. That would just "sound weird" to me. I just looked in the OED, and lox is listed with the plural "lox, loxes," so I guess you COULD say "we had 3 lox" or "we had 3 loxes," but man, that still sounds weird to me. I definitely wouldn't say that my mom (who loves lox) likes lox so much that she hides "them" so we won't find "them" if you see what I mean. Lox, to me, is definitely an "it." Sorry to go OT. Bringing it perhaps back on topic... when I was a child, about 5 years old, someone referred to me as a [bad name deleted] because I did not like lox. I thought it was a horrible thing to do, to make fun of a kid because she didn't like a particular kind of food, especially a kind of strange one like lox (which I now love btw)! I have made a particular effort to avoid making a big deal over my own kids' willingness to eat or not eat any particular foods specifically because I remember the shame and humiliation I suffered as a kid because of this one woman's careless comment (she was a friend of my mom's). Does anyone else have any parenting hotbuttons like that that come from their own childhood "trauma"? -- Hillary Israeli, VMD Lafayette Hill/PA/USA/Earth "Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it is too dark to read." --Groucho Marx |
#36
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Halloween candy
On 2005-11-19, dragonlady wrote:
In article , Kevin Karplus wrote: I believe that "lox" is an uncountable noun in English (like "bread"), which makes it grammatically singular for verbs, but you can't use the indefinite article "a". Lox is good. *I ate a lox. *I ate three lox. I'm not sure bread is a good example -- you CAN say "They served three different breads with dinner." So if they were seving more than one kind of lox, what would the sentence be? Actualy, "bread" is a good example of an uncountable noun. Many uncountable nouns become technical terms for types of the underlying object when used countably. To say "I sell three breads" in English would mean three types of bread, never three loaves of bread (unlike Spanish, for example, where "pan" is a countable noun, and the plural would refer to loaves of bread). Perhaps a better example would have been "rice", which, like "lox" ends with the "s" sound. An agronomist can refer to the many rices grown in California, but in ordinary usage, "rice" is uncountable and one has to add counting words (bowls, grains, kilos, ...). "Lox are good" is very open to being misheard as "locks are good," which may be a true statement, but not at all the same as "lox is good." ------------------------------------------------------------ Kevin Karplus http://www.soe.ucsc.edu/~karplus Professor of Biomolecular Engineering, University of California, Santa Cruz Undergraduate and Graduate Director, Bioinformatics (Senior member, IEEE) (Board of Directors, ISCB) life member (LAB, Adventure Cycling, American Youth Hostels) Effective Cycling Instructor #218-ck (lapsed) Affiliations for identification only. |
#38
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Halloween candy
In article ,
Kevin Karplus wrote: On 2005-11-19, dragonlady wrote: In article , Kevin Karplus wrote: I believe that "lox" is an uncountable noun in English (like "bread"), which makes it grammatically singular for verbs, but you can't use the indefinite article "a". Lox is good. *I ate a lox. *I ate three lox. I'm not sure bread is a good example -- you CAN say "They served three different breads with dinner." So if they were seving more than one kind of lox, what would the sentence be? Actualy, "bread" is a good example of an uncountable noun. Many uncountable nouns become technical terms for types of the underlying object when used countably. To say "I sell three breads" in English would mean three types of bread, never three loaves of bread (unlike Spanish, for example, where "pan" is a countable noun, and the plural would refer to loaves of bread). Perhaps a better example would have been "rice", which, like "lox" ends with the "s" sound. An agronomist can refer to the many rices grown in California, but in ordinary usage, "rice" is uncountable and one has to add counting words (bowls, grains, kilos, ...). "Lox are good" is very open to being misheard as "locks are good," which may be a true statement, but not at all the same as "lox is good." ------------------------------------------------------------ Kevin Karplus http://www.soe.ucsc.edu/~karplus Professor of Biomolecular Engineering, University of California, Santa Cruz Undergraduate and Graduate Director, Bioinformatics (Senior member, IEEE) (Board of Directors, ISCB) life member (LAB, Adventure Cycling, American Youth Hostels) Effective Cycling Instructor #218-ck (lapsed) Affiliations for identification only. But that doesn't answer the question: if you are serving more than one kind of lox, how do you say it? -- Children won't care how much you know until they know how much you care |
#39
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Halloween candy
Whether I put one piece or three pieces of lox on my bagel, I say that I'm putting "lox" on my bagel. When I go to a store that carries more than one kind of lox, I refer to it as "three kinds of lox" NOT "three loxes" or even "three lox". Kevin Karplus hit it on the head. I don't refer to "three breads" but to "three loaves of bread" or "three slices of bread" or "three kinds of bread". Lox works the same way. I prefer the Atlantic Harvest brand of lox from Trader Joe. It's much less salty than most other kinds of lox, but still has plenty of flavor. Much better even than most deli lox. --Beth Kevles http://web.mit.edu/kevles/www/nomilk.html -- a page for the milk-allergic Disclaimer: Nothing in this message should be construed as medical advice. Please consult with your own medical practicioner. NOTE: No email is read at my MIT address. Use the AOL one if you would like me to reply. |
#40
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Halloween candy
In ,
dragonlady wrote: * *But that doesn't answer the question: if you are serving more than one *kind of lox, how do you say it? "It." har dee har har. But seriously, folks - if you are serving more than one kind of lox, you say "On the stainless steel fish tray, I am serving Nova; on the leaf-shaped platter is gravlax, the tartan-trimmed china platter holds Scottish lox, and Uncle Morty's top-of-the-line regular is on the paper plates over there. Dig in - l'chaim!" -h. -- Hillary Israeli, VMD Lafayette Hill/PA/USA/Earth "Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it is too dark to read." --Groucho Marx |
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