Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2016 February 8

= February 8 =

Part of speech types and acronyms
In a simplified extract from a corpus, I found following PoS acronyms: A, C, D, I, J, M, N, P, R, T, U, V, X.

For example: 1 A  THE 5 A  A                      25  A  HIS 36 A  THEIR 42 A  HER 44 A  MY                     69  A  YOUR 78 A  ITS 79 A  OUR 93 A  NO           2  V  BE                      3  C  AND 7 T  TO             20  D  THIS 27 D  THAT 34 D  WHAT 43 D  ALL 58 D  WHICH 60 D  SOME 82 D  THESE 91 D  MORE 99 D  MANY 102 D  THOSE 547 D  HALF 620 D  LESS 2934 D  NEITHER 3761 D  MATTER 4547 D  NO      16  I  WITH 17 I  ON                     22  I  AT                     26  I  FROM 30 I  BY              8792  I  MINUS 8923 I  FOLLOWING 9340 I  ADJACENT 9407 I  OPPOSITE 9855 I  PRO 9864 I  UNTO 110 J  GOOD 141 J  HIGH 152 J  OLD 160 J  GREAT 162 J  BIG 51 M  ONE 80 M  TWO 86 M  FIRST 130 M  LAST 52 N  TIME 54 N  YEAR 62 N  PEOPLE 11 P  I                      50  R  UP                     55  R  SO                     64  R  OUT 66 R  JUST 72 R  NOW 76 R  HOW 77 R  THEN 81 R  MORE 87 R  ALSO 96 R  HERE 2083 U  HI                   2252  U  HELLO 2961 U  MM-HMM 3277 U  AH                   3804  U  WOW 28 X  NOT 29 X  N'T

I am trying to guess what the acronyms mean:

A = article, C = conjunction, D = ??? adjective ??? ,  I = ??? preposition ???, J = ??? adjective again ???, M = numeral, N = noun, P = pronoun, R = adverb T = only the 'to' in the category, but isn't it a preposition? U = exclamation/interjection, but why U? V = verb, X = Isn't this an adverb too? Anyway, one category for just two words.

Are my guesses right? What are the tags marked with '???' ? Couldn't they have used a different classification, for example, put 'a' and 'the' on one category, and 'my' and 'our' in another?

Llaanngg (talk) 02:00, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * D = determiner (this may be counted as a special kind of adjective or often as a distinct part of speech in its own right) (It's a little unclear why A and D are divided up the way they are; D seems to be demonstrative and quantifier. Not sure how 'MATTER' could have got in that category.)
 * X = negator (could be special kind of adverb or again its own category)
 * T = possibly a special category for 'to' used with infinitives (likely being counted as a category on its own distinct from 'to' used as a true preposition)
 * It would be interesting to see more examples for 'I'. Peter Grey (talk) 04:05, 8 February 2016 (UTC) (edit Peter Grey (talk) 04:49, 8 February 2016 (UTC))


 * More examples of 'I':

3500 I  FAVOR 3652 I  RE                   3657  I  SUBJECT 3704 I  RESPONSE 3855 I  AMID 4190 I  BESIDES 4208 I  OPPOSED 4212 I  SPITE 4236 I  ALONGSIDE 4246 I  REGARD 4300 I  RESPECT 4367 I  CHARGE 4474 I  BEHALF 4644 I  ATOP 74 I  LIKE 112 I  THROUGH 120 I  AFTER 124 I  OVER 140 I  BETWEEN 149 I  OUT 180 I  AGAINST 198 I  DURING 218 I  WITHOUT


 * Llaanngg (talk) 11:08, 8 February 2016 (UTC)

Yes, these are prepositions, including constituent words of complex prepositions. --My another account (talk) 18:25, 8 February 2016 (UTC)


 * "U = exclamation/interjection, but why U?" utterance?


 * Many other things are utterances, not just interjections. I suppose the 'I' was already taken, and maybe they avoided the 'E', which could be confused with 'expletive' by some. Llaanngg (talk) 09:12, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Is survived by or was survived by?
Hello! We have a dispute on the use of the words is survived by and was survived by in WP:DRN. The concerned article is Abe Vigoda, and I quote He is survived by his daughter, three grandchildren and a great-grandson. He (Abe Vigoda) is dead, obviously. His daughter, three grandchildren and a great-grandson are alive. What does the be verb here (is or was) refer to? And what should be used, is survived by or was survived by? Regards— UY Scuti Talk  09:39, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Both forms are correct at present. Since the "is" form might become false at some time in the future, following WP:MOS might be wisest for a Wikipedia article.    D b f i r s   10:01, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Conversely, in an obituary, it's nice to be reminded that life goes on. Not so nice to infer "for now". InedibleHulk (talk) 10:19, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * ... true, but Wikipedia doesn't write obituaries.   D b f i r s   10:26, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Certainly not. I wasn't saying that as a pro-"is" point, just explaining why it's done there. Newspapers are about the moment, then they line birdcages. Wikipedia lasts (relatively) forever. InedibleHulk (talk) 10:32, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Sorry, yes, I fully agree.   D b f i r s   10:34, 8 February 2016 (UTC)


 * Comment (I saw this at DRN, I have no other connection) I think the Wikipedia biography section is in effect an obituary. The MOS example gives 1972 as a "historical" event. The January 2016 event is not "historical"; it is news (and really is news to me). And in the context of this particular article where the subject has repeatedly been called dead, there is wit/humor in this being presented as the person's obituary (by using "is")...the reader gets to have a double-take "oh yeah, really he is dead this time, we'll see" which they only experience, or best experience, if "is" is used. It's good writing. :) And none of the survivors has died. So I think "is survived by" is accurate and most natural now, and should stay in place until one of the survivors dies or until the event has become "historical", I.e. Until a certain period has passed, and I suggest one year (with six months as the next best length of time). Some concern on the "was" side is legitimate, that we're setting up a future need for updating...what if no one participating remembers to come back and change it when 365 or 180 days have gone by? The phrasing would look bad, right? Well we could actually implement the decision right now by use of a template that chooses "is" or "was" according to whether current date is before death date plus 365 or 180. Like how "aged 35" or whatever shows in infobox of bios of living persons. (I offer to program the "is-was" template. In case the two parties might not agree on 365 or 180 or any other number, how about both stating they will each state and try to justify a number they prefer but agree in advance to abide by the impartial DRN moderator's choice of number. Hope this helps! do  ncr  am  11:06, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * You could get around it by leaving out the verb and just saying, "Survived by ..." ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 11:59, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Since the daughter, three grandchildren, and the great-grandson are still alive, 'is' is correct here, since they still survive him to the present day. If one of them were to die, the 'is' should revert to 'was', since it would no longer be the case that they all survive him. Akld guy (talk) 12:13, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * ... but they are not the subject of the sentence. Perhaps BB's solution would be best in view of the disagreements?    D b f i r s   12:16, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Both is/was survived are passive, the subject is the same in both cases. Llaanngg (talk) 14:34, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Correct, but the issue is tense (past or present), not mood. American In Brazil (talk) 20:21, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
 * ... as I said ... the subject is Abe Vigoda, and he was, though I suppose one does say is buried ...  D b f i r s   14:47, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * The distinction is between 'when' ("He was buried last year.") and 'where' ("He is buried in St. John's Cemetery."). American In Brazil (talk) 02:52, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * We can say "George Washington is considered the father of his country by many Americans", even though he's dead. The key thing is when the considering is being done--if it's in the present, "is" is correct, and if it's in the past, "was" is correct. Same with "is survived by..."--if the surviving is going on now, "is" is correct. Loraof (talk) 18:21, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Since the mood is passive ("George Washington is considered..."), "is" refers to the object of the preposition 'by', "many Americans", and is thus a contemporaneous (present tense) reference. You can see this by using the indicative mood ("Many Americans consider George Washington the father of his country.") American In Brazil (talk) 02:52, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Apostrophy S, will be the solution. Use "He 's survived by...", in the sentence. GoodDay (talk) 00:18, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * That would work for me.  Mlpearc  ( open channel ) 00:24, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * No, "he's" always means 'he is', never 'he was'. So that still begs the question. And I still think my response above is the correct one. Akld guy (talk) 00:50, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * "He's" can also mean "he has" plus the past participle: (he's given up his job). But that would create an awkward phrase ("He has been survived by..."). This is an additional argument for using the past tense 'was' ("He was survived by..."). American In Brazil (talk) 20:32, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

I've followed this discussion with considerable interest, since I'm the 'was' guy in this dispute. As a teacher of English to non-English speakers, I want to analyze the grammar and reference the correct usage of the sentence, which is currently, "He is survived by...". The subject of the sentence is "He" and the subject of the article is Abe Vigoda. Therefore, "He" refers to Mr. Vigoda, who is now deceased (and this time it's no joke!). The verb form is the third person singular of the irregular verb "to be", which can be expressed by the present "is" or the past "was". Since the verb is singular, it can only refer to the singular subject, in this case Mr. Vigoda, and not to the object, the survivors. At the time an obituary is written shortly after the death date, the contemporaneous "is" is frequently in common usage. But once the obituary has been published, the death date becomes an historical event. One would not say that George Washington "is" survived by his wife Martha, even if obituaries of the time used "is". Where the survivor(s) is/are still alive, the use of "was" remains the grammatically correct tense: "Elizabeth Taylor was survived by...". The amount of time after the death date and its announcement by an obituary becomes irrelevant, as does whether or not the survivors are still alive. And in this case none of the survivors are notable for WP purposes, so how would you know if a survivor had died? No less an authority than the Oxford English Dictionary, which scholars of the English language rely upon as the standard reference to definitions and grammar, agrees with this usage. It is the same for British and U.S. English (definition 1.2 of the verb 'survive' - to remain alive after the death of a particular person: 'he was survived by his wife and six children'): http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/survive?q=survived So much for correct English grammar. Now what does the WP Manual of Style have to say? As a general rule, it is best to follow WP:MOS, which is unambiguous on this point: Biographies of living persons should generally be written in the present tense, and biographies of deceased persons in the past tense...Historical events should be written in the past tense in all biographies(.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Biographies#Tense Therefore, the correct verb form in a WP article of a deceased person is "was". -American In Brazil (talk) 02:05, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * You still don't get it, the phrase in question is not referring to Abe, it refers to his family members.  Mlpearc  ( open channel ) 03:10, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * No, you have confused subject with object, a common grammatical error. The singular verb references the subject of the sentence "He" (Mr. Vigoda). In English, the subject and the verb form must agree in number (with one important exception - "you [singular] are/were"). For some reason, you still do not accept the grammatical authority of the Oxford English Dictionary and the usage standard of WP:MOS. American In Brazil (talk) 03:24, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * (I'll indent) This discussion is getting too hard to follow, in three different locations.  Mlpearc  ( open channel ) 02:57, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * your link is not to the Oxford English Dictionary but rather to OxfordDictionaries.com, which is based on two smaller dictionaries, Oxford Dictionary of English and New Oxford American Dictionary. Also, your appeal to the dictionary is unconvincing: it proves "was survived by" is grammatical, but does not prove that "is survived by" is ungrammatical.
 * I agree that "was survived" is more appropriate than "is survived" in an encyclopedia article. It's nothing to do with grammar: both are perfectly grammatical, and there plenty of contexts in which a deceased subject takes a present-tense verb. I conceded that for a short period after a death, "is survived" is more commonly found than "was survived", but that short period is the interval from news to history. Wikipedia is not Wikinews, and as far as Wikipedia is concerned, everything that has happened is history, not news. "A is survived by X, Y, and Z" reads like an obituary or newspaper report. I don't think "A was survived by X, Y, and Z" implies that one of X, Y, and Z has since also died. The suggestions that "is" should be changed to "was" after some fixed period (per User:doncram) is ridiculously impractical; doing so when one of the survivors dies (per Akld guy) even more so. A better option may be leaving out a "survived by" sentence altogether. Someone's spouse and children are likely already mentioned in the article;  if some predeceased the subject that may be also worth mentioning in its own right. If, say, 4 of their 7 grandchildren were born before they died and the other 3 afterwards, that's not likely to be worth mentioning.
 * jnestorius(talk) 13:16, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your insightful comment. The dictionaries you reference are both condensed versions of the Oxford English Dictionary, one with British usage and the other with American usage. The full version is 20 volumes! The online version has both and covers all of its references. As I stated, "is" is commonly used in obituaries, which are contemporary, but "was" is used historically thereafter. The OED uses the historical form.
 * The verb form 'is/was' is obviously singular and therefore refers to the singular subject "He" (the subject of this WP article, Abe Vigoda). As you correctly point out, along with Dbfirs and Inedible Hulk (above), an obituary in a newspaper is contemporary (which is used the next day to line your parakeet's bird cage), but a WP article is historical and continues online, potentially forever. To follow the survivors of the tens of thousands of notable deceased persons who are the subjects of WP articles is, again as you correctly observe, an impractical and, I would say, even impossible task. Mentioning family members who are referenced in an obituary of the subject is adding a material fact that was important to the subject during his/her lifetime, to a greater or lesser extent. The solution is simple, however, and that is to follow WP:MOS which is quoted above and again here: Biographies of living persons should generally be written in the present tense, and biographies of deceased persons in the past tense...Historical events should be written in the past tense in all biographies(.) That provides a usage standard that all editors should follow consistently in WP articles of deceased persons. Therefore, "was" is the correct verb tense. NOTE TO ALL - Can we finally arrive at concensus? American In Brazil (talk) 14:18, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * I was thinking mynah ("myna"?) birds. Parakeets don't need to read. InedibleHulk (talk) 17:41, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * @InedibleHulk. The parakeets around here mostly eat the mangoes on the trees. I don't want the birds eating my fruit, I want to eat my fruit. American In Brazil (talk) 00:20, 10 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Perhaps a spine-chilling scarakeet is in order? InedibleHulk (talk) 00:20, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Haven't seen too many of those around here. American In Brazil (talk) 17:46, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
 * How long does the Recent death template stay on an article? I'd venture "is" at least as long as that template is there, "was" thereafter.
 * Here's why I think that: As much as we want to say that this is an encyclopedia and not a newspaper, we know that people come here immediately after the death of a notable person looking for information. We wish to update the article as quickly as possible. I see no need for us to rush to edit all articles into "history/past tense" mode immediately on the subject's demise. In a project like this there is room for a transition period—an obituary period, if you will—where facts related to the death can be added quickly, without our worrying about anything else. Then, in some reasonable period of time, the article can be fully evolved to a post-mortem biographical. Just my two cents. StevenJ81 (talk) 18:19, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Recent death doesn't even qulifiy for most articles, per it's documentation but, that's a different discussion.  Mlpearc  ( open channel ) 18:58, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

I see there are varying opinions here too.. How about using Survived by.. as suggested above? Is that grammatically correct? Regards— UY Scuti Talk  01:33, 10 February 2016 (UTC)
 * @UY Scuti - The problem is that a complete sentence needs a verb to be grammatically correct. If one simply says, "Survived by..." it is an incomplete sentence. We use incomplete sentences in conversation all the time, but in a scholarly work like an encyclopedia, which is what WP is, complete sentences are necessary. Also, one cannot say "They is" to refer to the survivors, nor "He are" to refer to the subject, and be grammatically correct. As I have pointed out to @Mlpearc above, in English the subject and the verb form must agree in number (with the one important exception of "you [singular] are/were").
 * So we are right back to where we started: Which is the correct verb tense, past or present? I have argued above that the past tense is correct from an historical viewpoint, such as a WP article of a deceased person. WP:MOS agrees. Finally, can we find concensus which is in accordance with WP:MOS? (With your kind permission, I have taken the liberty of removing the new section reference, since this is an ongoing discussion of the same topic.) American In Brazil (talk) 18:02, 10 February 2016 (UTC)
 * You could say "Survived by (...), Vigoda died in his sleep on (...)". But I'm still partial to my way. Eliminate the conflict, not the opposition. InedibleHulk (talk) 00:17, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

If we use the past participle of the verb "to survive", as you suggest, we are using it as an adjective in a prepositional phrase: "Survived by...". Then we come to the main sentence: "...Vigoda died..." which of course is in the past tense. This reinforces my argument that the past tense is correct in a WP article of a deceased person. Since WP:MOS agrees, can we come to concensus that the past tense "was" is the correct verb form in the sentence: "Vigoda (is/was) survived by...". Who agrees, who doesn't? American In Brazil (talk) 17:17, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
 * It's disturbing that a teacher of English seems unable to spell 'consensus' correctly twice in this one section. Akld guy (talk) 00:34, 12 February 2016 (UTC)'
 * When you're right, you're right - and you're right. I sometimes think in Portuguese and write in English, or vice-versa. Now, can we come to a consensus? American In Brazil (talk) 01:12, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

Elsewhere, @UY Scuti has suggested the following sentence: "Survived by his daughter, three grandchildren and a great-grandson, Vigoda died in his sleep on January 26, 2016, at his daughter Carol Fuchs's home in Woodland Park, New Jersey." Of course, this is the past tense, which is what it should be: WP:MOS Biographies of living persons should generally be written in the present tense, and biographies of deceased persons in the past tense...Historical events should be written in the past tense in all biographies(.) It works for me. Does it work for anyone else? American In Brazil (talk) 13:31, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

Mardol
There is a street in Shrewsbury called "Mardol". The meaning of that name is always given as the "Devil's gate", or "Devil's boundary", with no further explanation. Can anyone suggest what language might give that translation? The only likely language other than English for a Shrewsbury street would be Welsh, but Google Translate doesn't support that theory. Maybe Anglo-Saxon? Rojomoke (talk) 10:39, 8 February 2016 (UTC)


 * I found this quote in a search result in Google Books, which wasn't visible in the "snippet view": "...there is also an above-average number of names apparently unique to Shrewsbury, some of which offer difficult etymological problems. ... those for Shoplatch and Waxchere are very tentative, while Cockbitestrete and Mardol have defied explanation." The Place-names of Shropshire: The major names of Shropshire, Margaret Gelling and H. D. G. Foxall, English Place-Name Society, 2004.  Alansplodge (talk) 11:25, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Thanks for that. The thing is, almost everybody in Shrewsbury knows the supposed meaning.  I was hoping for a suggestion as to the language it's believed to come from.  Rojomoke (talk) 11:41, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Google Translate autodetects it as Welsh for me. Only says it means "mardol" in English, though, so I don't know. The closest I see to a word for "devil" is the Albanian "djall", and "mur" means "wall" ("mur djall", not "djall mur"). Is there a language between Albanian and Welsh? InedibleHulk (talk) 13:33, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Salopian Shreds and Patches: Volume I (1874) p. 52 says that according to one local, the name is; "...derived from the Welsh maur (mawr), great, and dûl, a meadow". Alansplodge (talk) 13:48, 8 February 2016 (UTC)

This source explains it as "filth valley". Could be that filth is associated with the Devil? --Dweller (talk) 13:38, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Could you find a page number showing where that is in the text please Dweller? I could find it in a search result but not in the thesis itself. Alansplodge (talk) 14:02, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Sure, it's under MURDEFORD on page 130. --Dweller (talk) 14:45, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Erk. Sorry, my mistake. The source actually says that the filth valley idea is probably incorrect for Murdeford and it's more likely to come from the same source as Mardol, which is ... of unknown etymology. I think the answer here is that it's of ... unknown etymology. --Dweller (talk) 14:48, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Okay, I've got it. That page says that Mardol was first recorded as Mardevall in about 1215, which might explain why it has been linked with the devil, but rules out the Welsh theory. The author is connecting the first syllable of Murdeford (originally Merdevall) with that of Mardol (originally Mardevall), saying that the meaning of that element is unknown, and rejecting another theory that it derives from the French merde. Thanks Dweller. Alansplodge (talk) 17:54, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * According to this book on Shropshire, Mardol is "formerly Mardvole, the pond at the marshy pastures." Another source, consistent with this one, says that the old forms of Mardol are Marlesford, Mardefole, and Mardvole.  These names seem difficult to reconcile with a meaning of "devil's gate" or "devil's boundary."  John M Baker (talk) 17:34, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Rojomoke, I strongly doubt that it's OE; "devil's gate" would be "dēofoles gæt" ("devil" is a very old Germanic borrowing from Latin, and "gate" is proto-Germanic apparently), and I can't remember seeing anything like "Mardol" (whether the full word or its components) in OE. Nyttend (talk) 06:15, 13 February 2016 (UTC)

Is there an English idiom for this?
In Finnish, we have an idiom called Ei se ole minulta pois (literally: "It's nothing taken away from me"). It means that the speaker says that if something doesn't win or gain anything for him/her, at least it's not a loss for him/her either. Is there any equal idiom in English? J I P &#124; Talk 22:02, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * There are probably many. "It's no skin off my nose." and "I have no dog in this fight." come to mind.  Mnudelman (talk) 22:27, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * "It's no skin off my nose" seems it means something like the Finnish idiom. J I P  &#124; Talk 23:01, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * "It's all the same to me" is an idiomatic expression that's closer to the literal meaning. Tevildo (talk) 23:08, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Perhaps I expressed myself poorly. The emphasis is that the speaker doesn't feel he/she is losing anything. "It's no skin off my nose" sounds like it's a good English equivalent. The idea is that the speaker doesn't mind what other people do, as long as it's not hurting him/her personally. J I P  &#124; Talk 23:13, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * I expressed myself poorly here too. I didn't mean the speaker only cares about him/herself. I meant that the speaker primarily cares about not losing anything him/herself, and secondarily that everyone else is also OK. Whether the speaker him/herself wins or gains anything doesn't matter, as long as he/she doesn't lose anything. The latter is the main point. J I P  &#124; Talk 23:23, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * As an American native English speaker, both "It's all the same to me" and "It's no skin off my nose" mean nearly the same thing and would both be applicable in your example. The second sometimes could have the extra meaning that the person that you're saying it to did not insult you in any way by doing whatever it is that you're reacting to. Dismas |(talk) 23:43, 8 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Yes, but 'did not insult you' is a wrong shade of meaning, since it implies that there never was an insult. What really should be indicated is that the insult was ineffective, as shown by the victim's retort 'It's no skin off my nose.' Akld guy (talk) 00:01, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
 * In my former neck of the woods, the idiom was "it's no skin of my hide". Also heard quite often, with similar meaning, was "it don't make me no nevermind".--William Thweatt TalkContribs 00:11, 9 February 2016 (UTC)


 * All that seems to matter here is how vulgar you want to be. It's no skin off my arse/ass is older than the politer euphemism, "off my nose". The other options are all equal in underlying meaning, and there's  George Thorogood's "that don't befront me" option if you want to go that plain and common. μηδείς (talk) 03:19, 9 February 2016 (UTC)


 * In the Midwest of the USA where I grew up we used to say, "It's no skin off my back." American In Brazil (talk) 04:12, 9 February 2016 (UTC)


 * We used "no sweat off my sack" in my neighbourhood. The boys, anyway. InedibleHulk (talk) 05:31, 9 February 2016 (UTC)


 * (Detroit) I'd just say "It's none of my business". Now this doesn't actually explain that the reason it's not any of my business is because it doesn't affect me, but that's understood as being the case. StuRat (talk) 06:20, 10 February 2016 (UTC)
 * You wouldn't(?) say that to "We don't have Coke. RC Cola OK?" or "The couch is taken, you'll have to sleep in the manger." Propositions that affect you, just not particularly positively or negatively. "I don't care", maybe. Like they say in Finland. InedibleHulk (talk) 04:37, 11 February 2016 (UTC)