The dictionary is gaslighting me. I know I sound crazy, but that’s just proof of gaslighting, right? Let me explain. For years I’ve been telling people that they never have to agonize over whether to ...

Did you win the World Cup? Or maybe you just stayed in on your phone? If you want to talk about a completed action in the past, you need to use the preterite tense. You form the preterite by removing ...

Verbs are the action words in English, and they are the heart of every sentence. Understanding how to use different verb forms correctly is essential for clear, powerful, and accurate communication, ...

The past tense of "read" is a linguistic quirk that often trips up English language learners and even native speakers. While the spelling remains the same, the pronunciation shifts, marking a subtle ...

This article is reposted from the old WordPress incarnation of Not Exactly Rocket Science. The blog is on holiday until the start of October, when I’ll return with fresh material. For decades, ...