If the noun ends in a voiceless consonant sound (except a sibilant), then the plural is formed with the voiceless sibilant /sA which is spelled -5. Here are examples of all the consonant sounds that this rule applies to. | Simple Verb Complements 153 it I needed to hear what they had to say. it I like to get home early on Fridays. Gerunds it I love going for long walks in the fall. it I liked hearing what they had to say. it I like getting home early on Fridays. The nice thing about using a third-person pronoun to identify objects is that you don t even need to know the technical name for a complex object structure. All you need to know is that it can be replaced by a third-person pronoun. Exercise Underline the objects that follow the italicized transitive verbs. Confirm your answer by showing that a third-person pronoun can substitute for the object. it I noticed that you got a new computer. 1. They heard what you said. 2. The lawyers confirmed that we needed to consult a patent attorney. 3. They emphasized always being on time to meetings. 4. I anticipated having to get a taxi to get to work on time. 5. We finally chose to look for a new apartment closer to our jobs. 6. The contract specified that all the work had to be finished by June 30. 7. We resumed what we had been doing before we had to stop. 8. The audience appreciated how well they had performed. 9. We looked into taking a vacation in Mexico this summer. 10. You need to be more careful in the future. 154 Verb Phrases 11. The witness swore that the defendant had not been at the scene. 12. I couldn t resist making fun of such a ridiculous idea. 13. Nobody could understand his excited shouting. 14. Finally we recovered what we had initially invested in the company. 15. Please forgive what I said earlier. Separable and inseparable phrasal two-word verbs. Phrasal two-word verbs are an idiomatic combination of verbs and prepositions or adverbs whose meanings are often wildly unpredictable. Phrasal verbs also pose a major problem for nonnative speakers because they have some very unusual grammatical characteristics. In this section we will only examine what are called separable and inseparable phrasal verbs. A separable .
