Subject Verb Object, Right?
But we English speakers are rather used to other orders of those parts of speech. Third panel:
For one thing, it’s not a sentence; no verb—all three words are nouns. So she read it as “Customers: do the appreciation today” or something like that. How would you re-word the sign?
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I Mentioned This a While Back
This (verbing a noun) is a well-known linguistic feature of English. You can do a search in the box on the upper right for more.
I still don’t like using “office” as a verb.
Anthimeria is the technical term for doing this, but nobody uses it.
You can Make About any Noun into a Verb
For Example:
You don’t even need to put it between quotes.
Can you think of a noun that you can’t use as a verb?
Well and Good
I don’t recall mentioning this grade-school point of grammar before. The difference between “well” and “good.”
- Well—an adverb. Goes with verbs. Well done!
- Good—an adjective. Goes with nouns. Good lesson!
- Yes, both words can be nouns, but that’s a lesson for another day.
Okay, class, here’s a test. Did he get it correct or not? Last panel.
A Somewhat Bogus Rule
The problem with the rule is that nouns can so often be turned into verbs…
…so when you’re a verb, this is okay. But you know that, right?