Running Definition

It took more than 9 months to define "run" for the forthcoming Oxford English Dictionary because "run" has so many meanings. For variety in meanings, the word now outstrips "set," which has 200 senses. The NYT reports:

Her birthday: must set plans in motion. Run a bath, put on cologne, set the table. High anxiety. Run down list: set watch again, put water in glasses, set flowers. Run to the window — phew! Watch her put a finger to the doorbell. Such joy! What timing! And just as the sun sets, too!

Thus does an evening beckon, full of pleasantry and promise. But as described here it notes events in a manner of considerable interest for the lexicographer. For scattered within the vocabulary of this 54-word drama are 11 uses of the three most complex verbs in the English language: “set,” “put” and “run.”

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