These are only spelling variants. Adapter is the more common spelling, and therefore likely to cause less distraction for readers than adaptor. In fact, many spell checkers will mark adaptor as incorrect! An adapter is a device or person that adapts—that changes itself or something else in order to function in a certain context, such as a power […]

These two adjectives are related but have different meanings. Odious means offensive or worse than offensive—hateful and morally wrong: Human trafficking is among the most odious of crimes. Odorous describes strong smells—i.e., strong odors. It can refer to both good and bad smells: The skunk’s odorous spray is a mixture of sulfur-containing compounds. Odious in a Sentence Rita had […]

Both of these words can each appear as either noun or verb. The noun rein is almost always plural. Reins are a pair of straps used to control horses pulling a horse vehicle, such as a carriage or wagon. One end of each rein connects to the metal bit in the horse’s mouth, and the other end […]

Lay and Lie are among the most commonly confused verbs in English—at least when it comes to their shared meaning of “put or rest in a place.” Both words also have other meanings, which I’ll cover below. Lay is a transitive verb, and lie is an intransitive verb (transitive verbs have an object; intransitive verbs do not have objects)—but […]

Nascent is based on a root meaning “birth” and means “just beginning to come into existence.” It does not refer to “starting” in the sense of a game or a movie; nascent must refer to things that “grow” like a business, a project, or a life: Tina worked hard to build her nascent career after graduate school. […]