A Police or Police?

Quick Grammar Lesson

Police and the police are plural noun.

• Police are still searching for the fugitives.
• The police were called.

Do not say "a police" to mean one police officer. Say a police officer, an officer, a police man, a police woman, or a cop. So, the next time you saw a police officer arrested a thief, don't say "A police arrested the thief."

The following words are the synonyms for a police officer; they are slang words:
- cop (US) - shorten from 'copper'.
- copper (UK)
- po-po (US)
- Five-O - taken from the famous TV series "Hawaii Five-O".


DINNER VS. SUPPER

Do you know the difference between “dinner” and “supper”? Actually there’s is not much a difference between dinner and supper in American English.

Dinner or supper is the evening meal between 5 to 7 pm, or if later than that, more likely to be called as a “late dinner” or “late supper”. In some regions in the US, people call lunch (midday meal) to refer to dinner while others call dinner as supper. Either way, both regarded as the main meal of the day.

If you have a big meal as your midday meal – when most people call this midday meal as lunch – you most likely will have a light meal as supper later in the evening because your lunch was your dinner. But if you have a light meal as lunch, for example, sandwich, then in the evening you’ll have dinner as your big meal (main meal) and later in the evening you’ll have supper as the last meal of the day. Confused? Well, don’t be. :D

The term supper was derived from the French word “souper” which is related to soup. Supper is usually a light evening meal (lighter than dinner) and is served late in the evening after dinner. It is regarded as the last meal of the day.

Although the term dinner and supper are interchangeably, we don’t say “Let’s go out for supper”, but we say “Let’s go out for dinner”.



WHILE AND WHEN

Usually we use WHILE when there are two long actions. We can use progressive or simple tenses with while.

Usually we use WHEN if one action is long and the other is short, or if there are two short actions. We also use when if we talk about periods of our life (eg.: When I was 12 …)

1. He runs to his office every morning. Most people either drive or take public transport to work.

– runs to his office every morning = long action

– either drive or take public transport to work = long action

So we’d say,

He runs to his office every morning while most people either drive or take public transport to work.

2. It was raining. I was walking in the park.

– It was raining = long action.

– I was walking in the park = long action

So we’d say,

It was raining while I was walking in the park.

3. I saw lightning. I heard thunder.

– saw lightning = short action

– heard thunder = short action

So we’d say,

I saw lightning when I heard thunder.

4. We were having dinner. The telephone rang.

– having dinner = long action

– phone rang = short action.

So we’d say,

We were having dinner when the telephone rang.

5. The alarm bell rang. He was sleeping.

– He was sleeping = long action

– alarm bell rang = long or short action (Did it ring for a short time? Did it ring for a long time?)

It is unclear whether they are both long actions. So we can use when or while.

  • The alarm bell rang while she was sleeping.

  • The alarm bell rang when she was sleeping.