Date:  Thu, 17 Jul 1997 12:41:46 -0700
From:  "A. Maberry" <maberry[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]U.WASHINGTON.EDU>
Subject: Re: As best as I can remember

it grates on me too. "to the best of your recollection ..." sounds fine.
language inflation? maybe it's just a conflation of the two phrases.
allen
maberry[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]u.washington.edu

On Thu, 17 Jul 1997, Duane Campbell wrote:

> Watching the Senate Finance Committee hearings just now (I don't have much
> of a life), an attorney asked, "As best as you can remember . . ."
>
> It seems to me that in the last few years this phrase has almost completely
> replaced "as well as", even among well educated speakers. It grates on my
> ears. Am I wrong to think that this is grammatically incorrect, that you
> cannot compare a superlative? Is it language inflation? Or am I just being
> picky?
>
>
> Duane Campbell dcamp[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]epix.net
> http://www.epix.net/~dcamp/
>