English for Today by Ganiu Abisoye Bamgbose (GAB)
Do you know that:
You can conk someone but you can’t give them a conk. Conk as a verb means to hit on the head but conk as a noun means a nose, especially a large one.
You can visit a barber but he can’t barb (but he can give you a hair cut). A barber is someone whose profession is cutting customers’ hair but to barb is to furnish with barbs.
When you mean to tell a person to stop being angry, the idiom is “Cool it!”, not ” Cool down!”.
Ganiu Abisoye Bamgbose (GAB)
Academic Advisor, Distance Learning Centre, University of Ibadan;
&
Doctoral Student of English, University of Ibadan.
