One of the most difficult subtleties of the English language to explain and comprehend is the idiomatic verbal form used to versus the verb to be used to. In the simplest of terms, the former is a sort of past tense of the latter. A better way to differentiate between the two might be to say that the former means to have been in the habit of doing something that one is no longer in the habit of doing as opposed to the latter, which means being in the habit of doing something that one is ostensibly still in the habit of doing.
Can anyone describe this in simpler terms? I'm not even completely sure what kinds of verbs these are...
The Swedish word for the day is förmodligen. It means presumably.
- by Francis S.
Thursday, August 21, 2003
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