I’m going to start a new feature called “Confusing Words of the Week” where I take a set of two or three words that get confused and give you definitions and try to give you a memory trick to help you remember when to use which word. If you have words that confuse you, let me know and they may appear here soon!
This week’s confusing words are accept and except:
accept is to take or receive. He was ready to accept his new job duties. (He was ready to receive his new job duties.)
except is to exclude. He was ready for the new job duties except typing daily reports. (He was ready for all of his job duties excluding typing daily reports.)
The easiest way to remember which one to use is the EXcept is to EXclude. So if you want to EXclude something, you would say EXcept as in the following example:
I like all flavors of Life Savers EXCEPT lime.
That means if you take all of the flavors of Life Savers and exclude the lime ones, those are what I like.
If you are not going to EXclude something, you will accept it.
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