Re: USAGE: English adverbials 'the heck', 'the hell', etc.

Douglas Koller, Latin & French wrote:

>> John Quijada wrote:
>>
>>  > And a different restriction appears to operate in the
>>
>>>  following:
>>>
>>>  We trashed the hell out of his house.
>>
>
> Yes.
>
>>  > ?? We ate the hell out of those beans.
>
>
> I wouldn't classify this as necessarily ungrammatical per se, but it
> feels weird no matter what the context. (In other words, I understand
> the "??")


I'm not sure, but I'd say 'the hell' tends to signify something
destructive and/or intense.  'we ate the hell out of those beans' would
mean, roughly 'we ate (a lot of) those beans voraciously'.