Klryz
Pronunciation guide: IPA symbols, stress and word endings

Vowels

iːseeɪsite / ɛbedæcat
ɑːfatherɒhot (UK)ɔːlawʊput
uːtooʌcupɜːbirdəabout
eɪdayaɪmyɔɪboyaʊnow
əʊ / oʊgo (UK / US)ɪəneareəhairʊətour

Consonants that look unusual

θthinðthisʃsheʒmeasure
tʃchurchdʒjudgeŋsingjyes

p b t d k g f v s z h m n l r w sound as in ordinary English spelling.

Marks

  • ˈ main stress, before the stressed syllable: /ˈwɔːtə/ water · ˌ lighter (secondary) stress: /ˌʌndəˈstænd/ understand
  • ː a long vowel · (r) an r said only in accents that pronounce it (most American, Scottish, Irish)

Common word endings

  • -s / -es (plurals; he/she form of verbs): /s/ after voiceless sounds (cats), /z/ after voiced (dogs), /ɪz/ after s, z, sh, ch, j sounds (buses, watches). Spelling: -es after s, x, z, ch, sh; consonant + y → -ies (city → cities).
  • -ed (past): /t/ after voiceless sounds (walked), /d/ after voiced (played), /ɪd/ after t or d (wanted). Spelling: love → loved, stop → stopped, carry → carried.
  • -ing: make → making, run → running, see → seeing.
  • Irregular: go, went, gone · be, was, been · see, saw, seen · man → men · child → children · mouse → mice.
  • Older (King James) forms: -eth = -s (he loveth = he loves) · -est with “thou” (thou lovest) · spake = spoke.

English Dictionary · 107,383 entries · Sources & licences

lame duck

noun, verb

Forms lame ducks lame ducking lame ducked lame-duck lameduck

  1. noun (colloquial) A person or thing that is helpless, inefficient, or disabled.
  2. noun (US, politics) An elected official who has lost the recent election or is not eligible for reelection and is marking time until leaving office. “Congressman Jones was a lame duck and did not vote on many issues that were important to his constituents.”
  3. noun (finance, slang, dated) A person who cannot fulfill their contracts.
  4. noun (computing) A server that continues to serve ongoing requests while refusing new ones, allowing for graceful shutdown.
  5. verb (informal, transitive, intransitive) To behave in the manner of a lame duck.

Synonyms

duck

Etymology

Equivalent to lame + duck. First use appears c. 1761, in the London Evening Post. Derived from the situation in which a person who had defaulted in the London Stock Exchange was said to waddle out of Exchange Alley like a lame duck. Verbal form first appears c. 1910.

Sources: Wiktionary — from the Wiktionary entry “lame duck”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details