Dragaera

Updated pronunciation guide

Mark A Mandel mam at theworld.com
Thu Sep 30 16:29:56 PDT 2004

#Mark A Mandel wrote:
#
#> By the way, I wouldn't say that "two weeks' notice" is notice that
#> lasts two weeks. It is notice that informs of a (particular) event
#> that will occur in two weeks. Similar is "10 minutes' warning", not
#> to be confused grammatically with "a 10-minute warning" (where the
#> modifying phrase has been hyphenated into an adjective, losing all
#> number in the process, like "a 10-foot pole").
#
#Good point.   Her correction to "Two Weeks Warning" is to add an apostrophe.
#Mine is to drop the s.

Then it needs an article and probably a hyphen -- are we talking about
"warning" or "notice", or are they the same here?:
 - She quit without even giving us two weeks' notice! (Grammatical and
idiomatic)
 - She quit without even giving us a two-week notice! (Grammatical
though not idiomatic)
 - She quit without even giving us a two week notice! (Grammatical minus
a quibble)
 - She quit without even giving us two week notice! (Ungrammatical)

-- Dr. Whom, Consulting Linguist, Grammarian,
   Orthoepist, and Philological Busybody
   a.k.a. Mark A. Mandel
[I talk, Dragon NaturallySpeaking types, I correct. Neither of us is
perfect.]