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help with some English please.


DirePenguin

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Lol, no you're not! And by the way, I'm not familiar with "FML"?

It's an expression of dissatisfaction with the course one's life has taken.

The last two letters stand for 'My Life'.

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Um, not actually correct. I had to look it up, but I remembered discussing the term in law school. It means citizens are being pulled in by the authorities, or anyone else for that matter, to chase after a criminal. "Hue" does not refer to colour, it refers to the French word "huer", to shout, and "cry" comes from the French word "crier" cry out. So for example, a thief grabs something and a police officer, or the shop owner, raises the "hue and cry", calling on citizens to chase the thief. :D

That's very interesting and I can really see the picture in my head :) I also had never heard nor used the phrase "in back of" before. Thanks everyone!

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That's very interesting and I can really see the picture in my head :) I also had never heard nor used the phrase "in back of" before. Thanks everyone!

It is quite a bit where I live in the Appalachian Mountains in the USA.

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Was Mormont literally . . . naked? Without clothes I mean?

Ghost had it again. He watched as the direwolf buried his teeth in the wight’s gut and began to rip and tear. He watched, only half conscious, for a long moment before he finally remembered to look for his sword...and saw Lord Mormont, naked and groggy from sleep, standing in the doorway with an oil lamp in hand. Gnawed and fingerless, the arm thrashed on the floor, wriggling toward him.
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At the end, was Jon preying for the corpse to be flammable? Or was he preying for the fire not to go out?

The direwolf wrenched free and came to him as the wight struggled to rise, dark snakes spilling from the great wound in its belly. Jon plunged his hand into the flames, grabbed a fistful of the burning drapes, and whipped them at the dead man. Let it burn, he prayed as the cloth smothered the corpse, gods, please, please, let it burn.
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I've been reading these forums for a while, but this thread actually got me to register an account. I'm surprised at the unfamiliariaty with "crossed in back of"

Arya had two options when confronted with the obstacle of a wagon blocking her path. She could cross in back of (walk behind) the wagon. Alternatively she could cross in front of (walk in front of) the wagon. Fortunately for her she crossed in back of the wagon and saw her chest. This is similar to "crossing" a street in that you walk perpendicular to the direction of the object.

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I've been reading these forums for a while, but this thread actually got me to register an account. I'm surprised at the unfamiliariaty with "crossed in back of"

Arya had two options when confronted with the obstacle of a wagon blocking her path. She could cross in back of (walk behind) the wagon. Alternatively she could cross in front of (walk in front of) the wagon. Fortunately for her she crossed in back of the wagon and saw her chest. This is similar to "crossing" a street in that you walk perpendicular to the direction of the object.

Lol! You must be American to use the term, apparently, or North American anyway.

First post! Welcome to Westeros Jim Wolf! I assume that's North Carolina State? I'm a Canuck, what do I know, lol!

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All I can say is that it isn't a British English idiom (or at least not one I've ever come across) and it's not a usage that I had ever noticed until Dire Penguin brought it up.

Cross in front of - yes, fine we have that too. Cross in back of - meaning behind, no doesn't make sense to me. There you go, what a many splendoured thing our native tongue is :) .

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That's very interesting and I can really see the picture in my head :) I also had never heard nor used the phrase "in back of" before. Thanks everyone!

'Back of' is very old, according to one dictionary, dating back to the 1400s; think of the Cambridge Backs, where some colleges back onto the river Cam. Quite possible that the expression moved across the Atlantic with early European settlers then changed to 'in back of' as a US-regional expression. I'd say 'behind', myself, or even 'out back': eg, 'Where is X?' 'He's out back, in the garden.'

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Arya had two options when confronted with the obstacle of a wagon blocking her path. She could cross in back of (walk behind) the wagon. Alternatively she could cross in front of (walk in front of) the wagon. Fortunately for her she crossed in back of the wagon and saw her chest. This is similar to "crossing" a street in that you walk perpendicular to the direction of the object.

Wow. When you say 'cross in front of ... ' , I'm actually quite familiar with that and I see that all the time! What a surprise . . . replaced 'front' with 'back' and I was totally clueless :eek:

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