By Irony, Commas

Hi.From the perspective of a non-native speaker who's used to translate a lot (between German and English), I have a few things to add:While "somehow" and "barely" are not equivalents, neither semantic nor pragmatic, there are situations where cultural differences might make them look similar....

Juanita is brilliant and Shalimar has a pleasant personality. Here you just give the attributes of Juanita and Shalimar, who are sisters for example. Juanita is brilliant, and Shalimar has a pleasant personality. There must be a reason for a comma. For example someone has just said: "Juanita...

I definitely think that there is irony here. Otherwise "intimately" would not be in inverted commas. "Theatrical" for me is play on words, as suggested above: those people were both connected with theater and were "theatrical", artificial.

Yes; 'blimey' has become quite fashionable. But only in a certain tone of voice; and it must have inverted commas now. If someone tells you a startling fact, you look—startled: then you say, after a pause, and perhaps with a slightly upgraded accent, 'Blimey!' In the old 'Blimey' (Michael...