General Placeholder Names
English has many words whose definition includes an indefinite quantity, such as "lots", "many", "plenty", "several", and "some". A number of other words have been used to convey the idea in informal or humorous ways, such as "gobs of "(e.g., "gobs of jobs" career fair); and n-something, used especially to indicate someone's age within a decade, e.g., twentysomething.
Read more about this topic: Indefinite And Fictitious Large Numbers
Famous quotes containing the words general and/or names:
“No government can help the destinies of people who insist in putting sectional and class consciousness ahead of general weal.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)
“Every man who has lived for fifty years has buried a whole world or even two; he has grown used to its disappearance and accustomed to the new scenery of another act: but suddenly the names and faces of a time long dead appear more and more often on his way, calling up series of shades and pictures kept somewhere, “just in case” in the endless catacombs of the memory, making him smile or sigh, and sometimes almost weep.”
—Alexander Herzen (1812–1870)