"Power is cut off if the telephone is unplugged or if the wires are shorted". In this sentence, kindly advise whether it is ok to use the word shorted to mean short-circuited. ============== That's exactly the meaning and it's fine to

Some people are of the opinion that repeating things makes them true. I'm of a mind that that really isn't of much help, Temico.

Yup, it shorely does, Pieanne!

That sounds highly reasonable to me, Paco.

Temico, I'm intrigued by your statement, "Why do you think that the answer should have been B, may I ask? What word/s would you use instead of "been thinking"? If you used "thought", the sentence would be LOGICALLY incorrect." What would

Temico wrote: BTW, the sentence, "Jeff had thought of becoming a doctor but his parents wanted him to study law instead of medicine" does not mean that Jeff NEVER BECAME a doctor in the end. Woodcutter replied: And in your final example the

That would depend on how you use the expressions. e.g. a) His presence at the meeting WASN'T OF MUCH HELP. b) He WASN'T MUCH HELP---(much) more a nuisance, actually!! ============== I'm not sure it makes much difference, Temico, how

I've read in a certain paper that #1 and #2 behave differently: #1: John ate those sandwiches in an hour. #2: (?)John ate sandwiches in an hour. ... because in #2 there's no indication of a specific quantity of sandwiches, "eating" is

Since we know that "has been walking" is a possibilty and a strong one at that, I'd say that Jim's contention is too simplistic. Life and language are not formulaic. Context and, at least equally as important, what the speaker wishes to relay,

'Publish or perish', Ranchhand-- they'd never get funded for continued studies if they didn't publish. The sample question is from the GRE real test paper held in Oct. 1996. RH: True, Mr