[General] weed

[Silverobama]

Hi.

I went back to my house in the mountain resort. I found that only after one year, grass and flowers have grown in the garden. Is it natural to say "My garden is running to weeds"?

And I decided to rid my garden of the grass. Is it natural to say "Tomorrow I have to weed the garden".

 

[tedmc]

My garden is overgrown with weeds.

The second is fine.

 

[Charlie Bernstein]

Hi.

I went back to my house in the mountain resort. I found that after only one year, grass and flowers had grown in the garden. Is it natural to say "My garden is running to weeds"?

It's not natural. Say something like:

- My garden is overrun with weeds.

- My garden has gone to seed.

- My garden is overgrown.

And I decided to rid my garden of the weeds.

Grass isn't wrong, but any unwanted plant in a garden is usually called a weed.

Is it natural to say "Tomorrow I have to weed the garden".

Yes.

That's what I think!

 

[Silverobama]

It's not not natural. Say something like:

My garden is overun with weeds.

Should it be "It's not natural." and "My garden is overrun with weeds"?

 

[emsr2d2]

Should it be "It's not natural." and "My garden is overrun with weeds"?

Unless Charlie meant "It's not unnatural", then yes, that was an accidental repetition of "not".
"overun" is certainly a typo.

 

[Charlie Bernstein]

Should it be "It's not natural." and "My garden is overrun with weeds"?

Yes and yes!

Someday I'm going to learn to prufereed.

 

[Tdol]

Who doesn't make mistakes when typing in the dark?

 

[Skrej]

So, this thread turned out vastly different than where the title led me.

 

[GoesStation]

So, this thread turned out vastly different than where the title lead me.

Me too. ("Weed" is slang for cannabis.)

 

[emsr2d2]

Me too. ("Weed" is slang for cannabis.)

Me too, but that's because I thought we were going for the past simple of "wee" (to urinate)!

 

[GoesStation]

Me too, but that's because I thought we were going for the past simple of "wee" (to urinate)!

Another colorful word we don't use in American English. Our loss, eh?

 

[Tarheel]

So, this thread turned out vastly different than where the title lead me.

Silver, do you see the error?

 

[Silverobama]

So, this thread turned out vastly different than where the title lead me.

leads??

 

[jutfrank]

I thought we were going for the past simple of "wee" (to urinate)!

:lol:

I have weed in my garden. Have you?

 

[Skrej]

Off topic, but related to weeds and weeing:

I used to have a plot in our city's community garden for a number of years. Returners were allowed to keep their same plot, so over a few years I gradually became friends with an elderly guy who had one of the plots next to mine.

Every year in one corner of his plot, Dale would plant a small patch of what we call shattercane (a grass in the sorgum family), which can easily reach over 8 feet in height, and has lots of long leaves (similar to corn) - all of which make an excellent visual screen. It's also considered a noxious weed because it competes aggressively with desired crops for nutrients and moisture.

I should at this point mention that there was no toilet nearby, and no way to discretely relieve yourself, what with the community garden being right at the intersection of two busy roads in town. If you couldn't wait, it meant loading everything back up in your vehicle and driving to a bathroom, which of course could easily take 30 or 40 minutes (or more) of your time.

Dale, being in his late 70's, had some issues with bladder control - hence the small patch of shattercane, just big enough for one person to stand in the middle of and completely disappear from public sight for a minute or so.

I am unashamed to admit that there were a few times I too "watered" Dale's patch of shattercane, once shown the light. If nothing else, simply in homage to the man's simplistic genius.

Sadly, Dale suffered a heart attack not long after, and was bedridden for the remainder of his life. His plot was given to the next person on the waiting list, and the shattercane restroom was no more.

 

[emsr2d2]

So, this thread turned out vastly different than where the title led me.

Silver, do you see the error?

I note that Skrej has edited the original post, changing "lead" to "led". That is, I assume, the error Tarheel was referring to. Now, no offence to Skrej, but if a learner had written the sentence (with "led" spelled correctly), I would have pointed out an error anyway. It might be a BrE vs AmE difference, but I would have marked "different than" wrong. In BrE, at least, it should be "different from".

 

[jutfrank]

I would have pointed out an error anyway. It might be a BrE vs AmE difference, but I would have marked "different than" wrong. In BrE, at least, it should be "different from".

Again, I don't want to offend any of my esteemed fellow members but that was very painful for me to read, too. Unfortunately, it does seem to be a very common thing for some American English speakers to do. So far, it hasn't infected British English speakers to a noticeable degree yet. They use different to instead, which, though still cringeworthy, isn't half as bad.

 

[Rover_KE]

I thought we were going for the past simple of "wee" (to urinate)!

Me too. As in this old rhyme ('wee' also means 'small'):

When I was just a wee, wee tot,
They put me on my wee, wee pot
To see if I would wee or not.

But when they saw that I would not,
They took me off my wee, wee pot,
And put me in my wee, wee cot,
And there I wee-weed quite a lot.

 

[Tarheel]

leads??

No. See #16.