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Re: Aspects of English Grammar

From:Nik Taylor <yonjuuni@...>
Date:Saturday, March 13, 2004, 7:59
Philippe Caquant wrote:
> > Maybe it is in English, although in French it looks > rather natural: > Demain matin, a la meme heure, je serai sur le point > de prendre le train pour Madrid. > or: > dans douze mois, je serai sur le point de prendre ma > retraite (in 12 months, I'll be about to retire) > > As I can easily understand the idea, I can't see why > it couldn't be expressed, one way or another, in > English.
Well, it's probably *correct*, it just sounds (to me, at least) very awkward. Of course, talking about a future event being just a little before another future event isn't exactly a common topic. The retirement example, however, sounds okay to me. I'm not really quite clear on why the one sounds fine and the other doesn't. To be honest, I can't think of any other way of expressing your Madrid train example, except perhaps in something like "At this time tomorrow, I'll be waiting for the train to Madrid". "Will be about to" is just clumsy (although probably grammatical) -- "There's no such thing as 'cool'. Everyone's just a big dork or nerd, you just have to find people who are dorky the same way you are." - overheard ICQ: 18656696 AIM Screen-Name: NikTaylor42