- By Jim Evans
- Entertainment
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Smart TalkSMART TALK By Dr. Viva Palaver
LAG BEHIND: Actually, all you're doing is lagging. After all, as we tell our patients, you can't lag ahead.
You can lag behind the main group, but if you have no object for the preposition ("behind"), you have no need for a behind, either. In that sentence.
As staff psychologist at the Institute for the Linguistically Impaired, I ask patients who lag behind whether they remember getting left by the big kids. From that pain may come a compulsion to say left behind, left remaining, last of all, and last remnant.
Imagine the depth of the hurt that could cause such linguistic impairment.
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