Re: OT: contractions (Was Re: OT: Re: What? [...]) Mug," etc.

Mark J. Reed wrote at 2003-05-27 18:30:31 (-0400)
 > On Tue, May 27, 2003 at 10:52:59PM +0100, Tim May wrote:
 > > Andreas Johansson wrote at 2003-05-27 19:37:48 (+0200)
 > >
 > >  > They're, usually. I don't remember the exact wording I responded
 > >
 > > Incidentally, Andreas, your first sentence there is rather weird
 > > English.  You can't contract an operator in an elliptical sentence
 > > like that.
 >
 > That's rather strongly put.  I wouldn't say "can't" - clearly,
 > you can, because he did it :) -  but it's definitely unusual.
 > In spoken English, it would probably never even occur to someone
 > that you might have meant "They're, usually"; they would assume
 > you meant "There, usually".  Contractions of subject and verb are
 > generally only made when the verb is not the entire predicate.
 >

Well, _in my dialect at least_, and I imagine in standard English,
*"They're, usually." is absolutely grammatically incorrect.  I
suppose, given the matter of Andreas's previous post, there might be a
case for pointing out that I don't mean it's physically impossible, or
even that it can't be understood.  The stress should fall on "are",
for one thing.