French language Q&A Forum

The "preferred" translation indicates that their son fell asleep "a poings fermes," indicating that he was deeply asleep.  I dispute this -- kids may fall asleep with their fists closed, but not tightly unless they are under severe stress.  I would suggest that a better indication of deep sleep would be the other suggestion - "il dormait profondement."  This is from years of watching a number of sleeping children -- mine and others'.  Just a thought....

Would you be so kind as to explain what "fait une tete de plus que Marie" and "a gagne haut la main" mean.  I tried to look them up but to no avail.  I think I understand them in context, but would like a bit better understanding.  Thank you!!  I did try to click on the phrases in question but nothing appeared; it would be helpful if, once the test were completed, that mechanism worked on the dictees as well.  Is that possible to fix???

(I eat other things as well as potato)

I can't seem to find a straight answer about the use of the hyphen in this situation.  I know that object pronouns are attached to the positive imperative verb with a hyphen, so you would write, "Lisez-le!"  I am also informed that "ça" is a pronoun.  But somehow, I find "Lisez ça", not "Lisez-ça!" and I wonder if anybody has any thoughts about why.

Bonjour! For this part: "You cannot say: Tu ne veux venir pas ce soir. 

Is this only true for this sentence? Can someone elaborate on this further and  give another example using ne pas/plus/jamais between verbs (like tu peux ne pas venir). Thank you :)

Is there a general rule in French about when to spell out numbers? For example in american english I think the rule is to spell out numbers ten or less and just use the number when greater than ten (eg, 12 instead of twelve). Thanks!

what gender can be used with du des a'l' de la and de l'

Cueillir changes the 'ir' to 'er' before adding future endings, right?

and Vieillir keeps the 'ir' ending before the future ending.

Is there a list of regular 'ir verbs versus irregular 'ir verbs?

Thanks.

Why "prêts", and not "prêt"? "On", the subject of the sentence is singular.  Should not the adjective also be singular? 

«Vieux» might be considered an exception to this rule, as the adjective has 2 masculine singular forms, but the feminine singular form (vieille) always follows the form of «vieil» , regardless of whether followed by a vowel/mute h or a consonant. I don't know of any others - does anyone else?