104
You can use "Earworm" which means:
a song or melody that keeps repeating in one's mind
72
The verb itself is almost never used in every day English, but there are two adjectives formed from it which are common:
"scathing" means extremely harsh, biting, critical; e.g. "he launched into a scathing attack on his opponent's policies"; "the review was scathing in its criticism"
"unscathed" means "unharmed&...
69
While those might mean the same for the laymen, from a medical point of view, there is a difference between illness and sickness.
Medical sociology has long made the distinction between illness and sickness. Illness is the objective diagnosis that an external impartial observer is able to make based on the constellation of symptoms which the patient ...
52
Concur and agree are synonyms, but "I couldn't agree more" is a set phrase. While they technically mean the same thing, replacing agree with concur in that phrase sounds a little peculiar.
Concur is highly formal, commonly found in legislative or judicial settings. Agree is a more frequent and common word. "I couldn't agree more" is somewhat colloquial, so ...
50
You could say the song is "stuck in your head". I haven't found a dictionary listing the phrase, but here's a Time article on the subject, with the title "Why Do Songs Get Stuck In Your Head?"
For example usage, to express "after listening to a popular song you can't stop repeating it in your head" I would say:
I heard [popular song] on the radio, and ...
42
From a British perspective, I'm ill is more common and general term for when you're unwell.
Being sick can refer to actually throwing up or vomiting, but it can also be used for being generally unwell.
36
Agree and concur are synonyms, but the English usage of them corresponds to their etymology.
"Concur" derives from Latin concurrere, which literally means "to run (currere) together with (con) something or someone", and was also used for people gathering together in a crowd.
"Agree" derives from Latin "ad gratus" meaning "to be pleasing to (someone)".
"...
35
What about good old "so"?
German-made parts are way too expensive, so we ordered Chinese ones.
This is by far the most natural way of saying this.
33
The formal range of meanings for each word is more or less the same, but they carry different connotations and usage. It may vary from region to region, but in the USA, it is fairly common to use ill for longer or more serious issues, like cancer, and sick for more immediate things, like the nausea involved in cancer treatment.
Additionally, sick is used in ...
33
A photo, short for photograph, is always taken with a camera.
A picture is the most general term for any representation of a person, an object or a landscape. It can be a painting or a pencil drawing, etc.
The delimitation of image and picture has its difficulties. "image" has an overlapping area with "picture" and it has uses of its own where "image" is ...
31
Make no mistake about it, by far the most idiomatic way to say that is with the word rusty:
(of knowledge or a skill) impaired by lack of recent practice
Something that's rusty has been affected by rust. This is just like a piece of metal that has been lying around your backyard unused for a long time. And what happens to metal when it's under constant ...
29
In many cases they are synonyms, however a present is usually something that the giver has deliberately selected for the recipient. You can also call this a gift, but the word gift can be used for less selective things as well.
If I buy a box of chocolates and give it to my mother on her birthday, then that could equally well be called a present or a gift....
27
Personally, I wouldn't do either; I light a candle.
Kindle is a slow process, like when you're starting a fire in a fireplace. Kindling is little bits of wood or other material that you feed to the fire to get it going. Personally, it sounds weird to me if you're not talking about something like a wood fire.
Ignite is quick. If lightning hits something ...
23
Direct answer: no, "spell" never means "pronounce". Spell only refers to the letters used to form the written word.
The quote you cite would do better to use the word "transliterated" instead of "spelled". OED:
transliterate: To replace (letters or characters of one language) by those of another used to represent the same sounds; to write (a word, etc.)...
22
Compulsory (“Required; obligatory; mandatory”), mandatory (“Obligatory; required or commanded by authority”), and obligatory (“Imposing obligation, morally or legally; binding”) have related and similar meanings.
There are many examples where one of those words could be used in place of another, but in some areas, set phrases arise; for example, ...
21
Illness refers to a medical condition.
Sickness refers to the way one feels.
Illness often makes one feel sick, so the terms are often used interchangeably in colloquial speech.
But, one can be ill without being (feeling) sick. Likewise, one might feel sick after, say, seeing blood, without being ill.
20
You are looking for a job.
I don't think you would be satisfied with just a "job opportunity". If you were offered a "job opportunity", you would want to follow through until you either got the job, or did not get the job.
Similarly, a child who wants to pet a cat does not want a "Schrödinger's cat", because Shrödinger's cat has a 50% chance of being dead ...
19
I guess you want to use a subordinate conjunction (or a phrase with similar functionality) which simply means "because". In this context, I can mention several ones as below:
Thus
Therefore
Hence
consequently
In this regard
With this regard
Under this consideration
...
However, I think you can reword that sentence to a more concise sentence:
Since German-...
18
Here are some simple rules that will help deciding which word to use:
See is used as inactive word; you just see without any effort:
you have visual impression: "I can see my home over there", "I see trees of green"
you understand: "I see what you mean"
Look is used as active word, you make an effort to see:
you try to see: "look at this!" (maybe you ...
18
They are separate words.
Something reoccurs if it happens more than once.
Something recurs if it happens more than once and at a regular interval. A good example would be your electricity bill – most people pay monthly or every quarter, and so they have a monthly-recurring or quarterly-recurring bill.
Compare these dictionary definitions (from ...
17
Perhaps, the word "relieve" meaning 'to take the place of someone and continue doing their job or duties' would suit better:
I'm on duty until 2 p.m. and then Peter is coming to relieve me.
A part-time bookkeeper will relieve you of the burden of chasing
unpaid invoices and paying bills. (=A part-time bookkeeper will take this unpleasant task from ...
16
Consider excellent
very good of its kind, eminently good
or outstanding.
extremely good or excellent
note that these words start with vowels, so the 'a' turns into 'an'
16
The phrase lighten one's load is not uncommon.
The Synonym Finder lists Lighten one's load, lighten the load, or ease the load as synonyms for disburden, unload, assist, aid, unburden, and help.
14
In the past when there were no computers, in office or in any secured place, people sign in by signing their signature and time in while entering into the place. When they leave, they sign out by putting the time out and sign. Website followed these words (sign-in and sign-out) in the similar way when computers came.
The notebook that people sign in and ...
14
There is quite a difference, both in the denotation and the connotation, at least in US usage. (Being an American speaker, I can't say for certain what differences might exist overseas.)
"Wage" refers to payment in exchange for work for a particular period of time. In most American work arrangements, a person who's paid a wage is going to be paid hourly. ...
14
The legal term here is...
testator - a person who dies leaving a will or testament in force
...but you'd rarely hear that in normal conversational contexts. Ordinary people don't have a word for "person who died leaving a will" - presumably because there's little need for it outside of legal contexts.
BUT - if we move slightly away from the ...
answered Jun 19 at 12:38
FumbleFingers Reinstate Monica
53.5k2 gold badges64 silver badges149 bronze badges
13
Pretty is "to a moderately high degree; fairly", whereas quite can have two meanings: "to the utmost or most absolute extent or degree; absolutely; completely" or "to a certain or fairly significant extent or degree; fairly: ". So they may be synonymous; sometimes may be not.
In each of the contexts you have cited, whenever you would use "quite" it can ...
13
As is used to mean because, but it is also used when two events happen at the same time.
In "I must stop now as I have to go out." it means because, but in "She watched him as the train passed close to his house." it doesn't mean because.
As for the sentences you used as examples, both are correct.
13
Wealthy and Rich are both synonymous in terms of money. Both mean "having a great deal of money and assets". So you can interchangebly use them to convey Bill Gates is rich.
However, you can see rich has various usages other than abundance of money. They can be found in the Oxford Dictionary hyperlink I have attached.
13
Note that, very strictly speaking, a program doesn't have an implementation. A program is an implementation: the implementation of a design, which follows from a specification.
"To realize" is similar to "to implement", but is a little bit broader. To realize means to achieve a plan, whereas to implement is to put into effect a very specific plan.
So for ...
Only top voted, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible
