Separable Verbs Don’t Have to be Logical

I like comics that feature grammarians, though I think he’s overdoing it a bit here.

“Tie up” and “tie down,” for example, are both idiomatic, and they have different meanings, but neither is exactly precise.

Can you think of any other separable verbs that technically don’t make sense? Put your list in the comments.

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Brooke McEldowney is one of my favorite cartoonists, partly because he does his grammar well. I’m certain this is intentional:

I’ve written about separable verbs (e.g. to gross out, to put up with) before. In the upper right corner you can do a search on “separable” to find my other posts on the subject. He’s following the bogus rule not to end a sentence with a preposition. (See those previous posts.)

And the “whom” is correct. “Whom” is the direct object, even though it serves as an interrogative.

Separable verbs have a certain amount of flexibility—sometimes you put both parts of the verb together and sometimes you can separate them. Here’s a sentence in a weather report that could go either way, but one way doesn’t make sense. Beware of this possibility when you write!

 Gusty winds may also blow around unsecured objects. 

So what’s blowing around? Does the wind go around the objects, or does the the wind blow the objects around?

The warning was issued April 26, 2020, so you don’t need to worry. It was pretty windy that day.

Here’s a picture:

Here’s the rule:

If it can be misunderstood, rewrite it!

In this case, a separable verb, pin down. It’s at the bottom.

I think that’s how you do it, anyway. How would you do it?

The young lady is not usually an example of good things in the Luann comic, but she illustrates a good point here.

You have permission to end a sentence with a “preposition”!

Actually it’s an adverb, or part of a separable verb, if you prefer. Use the search box on the upper right corner to see more posts on this subject.

Okay, so here’s the comic.

Maybe that last panel is a good illustration of why you can do this.