Sometimes I’m not sure if I’m reading Keystone Kops or a serious story when I fall across this particular confusion.
Of course, it’s always possible that somewhere in the storyline someone is intending to slip a dose of poison to a dozing person or . . . is that bore someone into dozing himself into a dose?
Wait, I’m confused . . .
Word Confusions . . .
. . . started as my way of dealing with a professional frustration with properly spelled words that were out of context in manuscripts I was editing as well as books I was reviewing. It evolved into a sharing of information with y’all. I’m hoping you’ll share with us words that have been a bête noire for you from either end.
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Dose | Doze |
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Part of Grammar: | |
Noun; Verb, intransitive & transitive Plural for the noun: doses Third person present verb: doses |
Noun 1; Verb 2; Verb 1, intransitive & transitive
Plural for the noun: dozes Third person present verb: dozes |
Noun: Quantity of medicine or drug taken or recommended to be taken at a particular time A substance, situation, or quantity of anything analogous to medicine, especially of something disagreeable [Vinification] An amount of sugar added in the production of champagne [Physics] The quantity of ionizing radiation absorbed by a unit mass of matter, especially living tissue [Slang] A case of gonorrhea or syphilis Verb, intransitive: Verb, transitive:
To divide as a medicine into doses To treat with an application or agent |
Noun: A short light sleep 1
Verb: Verb, intransitive:
[Often followed by off] To fall into a light sleep unintentionally To sleep for a short time
To be dull or half asleep Verb, transitive: |
Examples: | |
Noun: Take a dose of cold medicine before you go to bed. Be careful that the dose of radiation doesn’t exceed the safety limits. Damn, I got a dose of the clap. I wanted to give you a dose of the hell you put me through. Computer games are great in small doses. Failing the exam was a hard dose to swallow. I prefer champagnes with less sugar, such as an extra-brut which has a dose between 0 and 6 grams per liter of residual sugars. Kenny added a healthy dose of skepticism to the discussion. Verb, intransitive: Verb, transitive: The champagne was dosed with sugar. That creep dosed my drink! Most patients are dosed at 50 milligrams per day. |
Noun: I had a short doze this afternoon. After lunch, I had a doze. He slipped off into a light doze. Verb: Doze that hill down now. Use the bulldozer to doze the wall down. Verb, intransitive: No, he’s just dozing. I must have dozed off. Verb, transitive: He dozed the summer away. “The room is empty of everything but the bed in which I lie, a small table, and a plain wooden chair occupied by a dozing Helene” (Tahir). |
Derivatives: | |
Adjective: well-dosed Noun: dosage, doser, superdose, underdose Verb, transitive: underdose, underdosed, underdosing |
Adjective: dozy Noun: dozer |
Phrasal Verb | |
doze off | |
History of the Word: | |
Late Middle English from the French, via late Latin from the Greek dosis meaning gift from didonai meaning give. |
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C’mon, get it out of your system, bitch, whine, moan . . . which words are your pet peeves? Also, please note that I try to be as accurate as I can, but mistakes happen or I miss something. Email me if you find errors, so I can fix them . . . and we’ll all benefit!
Satisfy your curiosity about other Word Confusions on its homepage or more generally explore the index of self-editing posts. You may also want to explore Book Layout & Formatting Ideas, Formatting Tips, Grammar Explanations, Linguistics, Publishing Tips, the Properly Punctuated, Writing Ideas and Resources, and Working Your Website.
Resources for Dose versus Doze
Some of these links may be affiliate links, and I will earn a small percentage, if you should buy it. It does not affect the price you pay.
Apple Dictionary.com
The Free Dictionary: doze
Merriam-Webster: dose
Tahir, Sabaa. An Ember in the Ashes. Razorbill, 2015. <https://amzn.to/3A6eje8>. Ebook.
Pinterest Photo Credits:
Contemplation by Stu is under the CC BY-SA 2.0 license, via Flickr.
Revised as of 10 Apr 2024
By: Kathy Davie