Lay means to put or place someone or something somewhere. Lie means to recline, rest, or remain in a particular position. Compare: Please lay the architectural drawings flat on the table. The original drawings lie in a locked cabinet. In…
Comparative adverbs compare how actions are performed or how an action changes. Superlative adverbs express the highest or lowest degree within a group or across different situations. The second technician completed the installation faster than the first. Of the four…
The position of an adverb depends on what it modifies and the meaning you want to express. An adverb may appear at the beginning, in the middle, or at the end of a clause, but some positions are more natural…
A room can be cold, or it can be freezing. You can feel tired, or you can be exhausted after a long journey. Words such as freezing and exhausted do more than describe a quality. They express it at a…
A meeting can be slightly tense, quite tense, or extremely tense. The adjective tense allows different degrees of the same quality. Other adjectives behave differently. Something described as identical, medical, or freezing does not fit the same scale in the…
A quiet neighborhood, a former colleague, and an unexpected delay all use adjectives before nouns. When an adjective is used this way, it is in attributive position. Many English adjectives can also appear after linking verbs, but some strongly prefer…
AM and PM are used with the 12-hour clock to show which half of the day a time belongs to. AM refers to times before midday, while PM refers to times after midday. Most times are straightforward. The confusing part…
Etc. is short for et cetera and is used to show that a list could continue with other similar items. We bought notebooks, pens, folders, etc. The abbreviation is useful when the examples already make the rest of the group…
E.g. and i.e. are both Latin abbreviations, but they do different jobs. Use e.g. to introduce one or more examples. Use i.e. to clarify, define, or restate exactly what you mean. That difference can change the meaning of a sentence.…