Is there a general rule whether to use the Verb + to infinitive or the Verb + ...ing format?
There are cases in which I can't decide which one to use.
Like:
-They can't afford to go out very often.
-They can't afford going out very often.
Or:
-I don't mind to wait.
-I don't mind waiting.
Or:
-It was a nice day, so we decided to go for a walk.
-It was a nice day, so we decided going for a walk.
I've been confused about this as long as I can remember. Should it be:
One should do ones duty.
or
One should do one's duty.
I'm guessing it should be the latter. But that doesn't sit well with the possessive pronoun 'its'. For example:
It is its own purpose.
vs.
It is it's own purpose.
Here, the former seems clearly correct.
Answer
The correct answer is one's!
All possessives get an apostrophe, except the standard possessive pronouns and these are:
yours, his, hers, ours, theirs, its
Apart of these, always add an apostrophe.
What is grammatically incorrect with the sentence: "Moving to a new town and making new friends is hard for people of all ages."?
Is it the subject/verb agreement?
As far as I can tell, my question is not a duplicate of either of these two similar questions. It is very close (maybe a duplicate, but I don't quite think so) of this question.
I want to construct a sentence, where there are two things each possessed by one of two people, one of whom is myself. The best I have come up with is something like:
Fred's and my houses are both green.
Two houses, two people (Fred and myself). I'm not sure how to phrase it at all!
I suppose I could go with a longer form like:
Fred's house is green and my house is also green.
But it would be nice if there was a shorter form.
I would like to know which would be the correct form:
- a major two-day auction
- a major two days auction
The duration of the auction is two days. Which form is the right one to use?
When attributing a quote to someone, you put a comma before the quote:
John said, "———"
But is the comma still used in the following sentence?
John's last words were, "———."
Or should there be something else instead? A colon maybe?
Answer
Many publishers still seem to use commas before quotations, as in your first example, but Larry Trask argued persuasively against doing so:
A sentence containing a quotation is punctuated exactly like any other
sentence apart from the addition of the quotation marks. You should
not insert additional punctuation marks into the sentence merely to
warn the reader that a quotation is coming up: that's what the
quotation marks are for. Hence the first two of the following are bad
style, and the third one is wrong:
*President Nixon declared, "I am not a crook."
*President Nixon declared: "I am not a crook."
*President Nixon declared:- "I am not a crook."
The comma and the colon in the first two are completely pointless,
while the startling
arsenal of punctuation in the third is grotesque. (Remember, a colon
can never be followed by a hyphen or a dash.) Here is the sentence
with proper punctuation: President Nixon declared "I am not a crook."
Adding more dots and squiggles to this perfectly clear sentence would
do absolutely nothing to improve it. No punctuation mark should be
used if it is not necessary.
‘The Cambridge Guide to English Usage’ largely endorses this approach, describing the comma before a quotation as an ‘older convention’.
There is even less of a need for a comma in your second example.
When using the phrase "types of" or "kinds of," it often seems appropriate to follow with a singular noun (e.g., types of rock), but at other times a plural noun sounds better (e.g., types of sentences). Is there some kind of rule about this?
Answer
I think your essential concern is about countable vs. uncountable nouns. Countable nouns can be singular or plural; uncountable nouns are singular. Some words can be both, in different meanings.
Take a look at this example discussing countable and uncountable nouns:
The coffees I prefer are Arabica and Brazilian.
(Here coffees refers to different types of coffee)
You could write, "The types of coffee I prefer are Arabica and Brazilian."
So with your example:
The rocks I like are basalt and granite. [Rocks are countable]
The types of rock I like are basalt and granite. [Rock is uncountable]
When rock is taking on the uncountable meaning, it's not one rock - it's the idea of rock, the general concept. The only senses in which this is familiar to me are the "solid mineral" one and rock as in "rock music," where you might say, "The types of rock I like are grunge and punk."
Contrast the other part of your example:
The sentences I like are about geology. [Sentences are countable]
The types of sentences I like are about geology. [Sentences are still countable]
Sentences don't have an uncountable meaning:
*The types of sentence I like are about geology. [Ungrammatical for most speakers, I think]