Man and woman, I said? In this day and age, forget gender! The problem is even more poignant if we consider any combination of Homo and Hetero sapiens getting married. Which name do they take?

The auto mechanic is a diamond in the rough, tough-talking, but honest, even generous.

By repeating a form of words after a gentleman in a glazed cap and black raiment, we had suffered change into base assassins, the offscouring of society, starving for want of employment, and willing to “imbrue our coarse fists in fraternal blood” for the sum of eleven dollars a month, besides hard-tack, salt junk, and the hope of a Confederate States bond apiece for bounty, or free loot in the treasuries of Florida, Mississippi, and Arkansas, after the war.

'John doesn't speak any French', explained the wife of one highly-placed British Eurocreep, 'and his secretary is French, so of course that makes things quite difficult for him.'