Friday, November 11, 2011

EUTAM: Needs

This is an EUTAM that isn't so much an incorrect usage of English, just one that specifically gets on my nerves.

It's the use of the word "needs" as a noun, viz, "For all your albino elephant juggling needs."

I don't know why this particular usage bugs me, but it does. I don't even have a better way to say what this sentence intends to convey. The thing advertised serves all of your albino elephant juggling needs. It is the thing you need to have when you're juggling a lot of albino elephants.

I mean, I suppose you could say, "This thing is what you need when you're juggling albino elephants," but it doesn't quite convey the same sense, does it?

I don't know. Needs. I don't like it. Anyone have anything else like that - a EUTAM that isn't wrong, and you don't have a better way of saying it, but it just bugs you?