Re: USAGE: "I want crazy two years ago"

This is a colloquial usage of "go" to mean "become."

He went postal. He went crazy. He went Republican.
After a week of working in a slaughter house, he went
vegetarian.

When I was a teenager, there was a song with a line
something like "If you need me, I'll be there in a hurry."
Every time I heard it, I pictured someone driving up in
a vehicle called a "hurry."

"What kind of idiot do you take me for?"
"I don't know. How many kinds are there?"

--Ph. D.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Sally Caves" <scaves@...>
To: <CONLANG@...>
Sent: Thursday, July 13, 2006 11:52 AM
Subject: Re: USAGE: "I want crazy two years ago"


> Would "I was going crazy" be more acceptable?
> I've heard that construction a lot.  Is it that it's put
> in the simple preterite the problem?
>
> Sally
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Sai Emrys" <sai@...>
> To: <CONLANG@...>
> Sent: Thursday, July 13, 2006 2:58 AM
> Subject: USAGE: "I want crazy two years ago"
>
> >I saw that line in a profile.
> >
> > My response as a question: "What sort of crazy did
> > you go?"
> >
> > That seems like a really funny construction to me.

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