" Grammaticly wrong or right"

[Radman]

Hi there,
First,I am afraid the title is not obvious because I was not sure how to put it.

"Watching my colleagues creep round the boss is pretty disgusting ."

Is the sentence formal or informal for writing? Can we use it for our speech or it is ambiguous? I want to know the action of watching is disgusting or the action of Creeping round ? And if both of them is correct,how can be sure the others get us right.

Another example : Watching people throwing litter is incredibly annoying.

Thanks a lot.

 

[bhaisahab]

Hi there,
First,I am afraid the title is not obvious because I was not sure how to put it.

"Watching my colleagues creep round the boss is pretty disgusting ."

Is the sentence formal or informal for writing? Can we use it for our speech or it is ambiguous? I want to know the action of watching is disgusting or the action of Creeping round ? And if both of them is correct,how can be sure the others get us right.

Another example : Watching people throwing litter is incredibly annoying.

Thanks a lot.

It's fairly informal and not at all ambiguous.

 

[JMurray]

not a teacher

If I understand correctly what you mean, then for me a more natural form would be: "Watching my colleagues crawl to the boss is pretty disgusting".

 

[Tdol]

In BrE, we could say creep up to the boss.

 

[emsr2d2]

Are we talking about your work colleagues physically approaching your boss very quietly and hoping that he doesn't notice? That would be "creeping up on". If they are being obsequious, constantly being nice to him, taking him coffee, complimenting him on his work and his appearance etc in an attempt to make him like them, then it would be "creeping up to" or "crawling to".

Context is everything. If you are talking about a baby who cannot yet walk, then it "crawls" everywhere. It crawls round the room, it crawls to its mother, it crawls up to its father etc. An adult who is trying to get promotion at work crawls up to the boss. That adult is not on his hands and knees (well, let's hope he's not!)

 

[MikeNewYork]

Hi there,
First,I am afraid the title is not obvious because I was not sure how to put it.

"Watching my colleagues creep round the boss is pretty disgusting ."

Is the sentence formal or informal for writing? Can we use it for our speech or it is ambiguous? I want to know the action of watching is disgusting or the action of Creeping round ? And if both of them is correct,how can be sure the others get us right.

Another example : Watching people throwing litter is incredibly annoying.

Thanks a lot.

Please note that the spelling "grammaticly" in your title is incorrect. It should be "grammatically".

 

[Rover_KE]

First,I am afraid the title is not obvious because I was not sure how to put it.

A better title would have been Watching my colleagues creep round the boss is pretty disgusting.



'Thread titles should include all or part of the word/phrase being discussed.'

 

[Barb_D]

I had been unaware of the two verbs used by ems in her post. Those are not used (to my knowledge) in American English.

We have "sucking up to," though.

 

[Rover_KE]

...or (even more disgusting) 'brown-nosing'.

 

[MikeNewYork]

I just learned a new synonym for "brown-nose", "suck-up", and "kiss-ass", "keener" in Canadian English.

For those who are interested there are more "Canadianisms" here: 55 Canadianisms You May Not Know or Are Using Differently | GeekMomGeekMom