damn it...

i give up

?

Hmm... Is it a fashion? It sounds so familiar.

@snailboat That "please delete me" message.

nods

Oh, there is an option saying, "I would like to advertise on Stack Exchange", too.

@snailboat Es can be used to mean Spanish indeed!

This is actually quite interesting, syntactically.

It makes me think, is "Ladies first" just a phrase or a complete sentence?

@snailboat It sounds as if we omitted the verb in that sentence, which is, I think, rare in English!

Oh, I think I'm not sure how we should parse that!

@snailboat And I don't even notice that they do exist! Even though I also use it regularly.

I still like Barrie England's answer anyway. :-)

Admittedly, I haven't read Araucaria's latest edition yet.

@Arrowfar Yes, this is an instance of backshift - in traditional grammar it was called 'sequence of tenses'. It is, as you say, 'optional'. When the head clause is tensed in the past, the proposition expressed in the subordinate clause ordinarily takes the past tense too, so the two clauses live in the same time frame. But if the subordinated proposition endures into the present, you are free to cast it into the present tense. ...

It's really a matter of focus. If your discourse is centrally concerned with past events -- a narrative, for instance, in which you are recounting what was said in the chat room on that past occasion -- then you will want to cast your subordinate clause in the past. But if your discourse is centrally concerned with the proposition itself, and you mention the past event only to introduce the proposition, then you will want to cast the subordinate clause in the present.

Context, context, context!

In that context, where your discourse is about the belief which you and your readers hold now, casting the subordinate clause in present tense is entirely appropriate.

hi

This is really hard to transcribe without already knowing the original.

My first time through I got about half of it - mostly second hemistichs, where she to some extent abandons the tortured vowels. The heavy reverb doesn't help.

I did a little hunt for this version of song because one promo video of Under the Dome uses it as the backing track, and all I could make out from "At first" to "my side" (about the first 23 seconds in the clip) was "I was petrified"!

Beyond that they faded the backing track all the way until they let "I will survive" come up into the front again, and yet the original had never crossed my mind!

@StoneyB I learned a new word, hemistichs! Thanks!

I can't explain what she did to the sounds. I think whatever she did, it was on purpose.

I tried to find more information about the singer, but to no avail.

All I know is her (probably stage) name: Blu Holliday

A lot of consonants and vowels are very distorted to my ear, even in the verses that are easier to make out. For example, "I learn how nu get along." (I'm pretty sure she didn't vocalize -ed in there.)