(v. t.) To lay a claim to; to allege a title to; to claim.
(v. t.) To hold before, or put forward, as a cloak or disguise for something else; to exhibit as a veil for something hidden.
(v. t.) To hold out, or represent, falsely; to put forward, or offer, as true or real (something untrue or unreal); to show hypocritically, or for the purpose of deceiving; to simulate; to feign; as, to pretend friendship.
(v. t.) To intend; to design; to plot; to attempt.
(v. t.) To hold before one; to extend.
(v. i.) To put in, or make, a claim, truly or falsely; to allege a title; to lay claim to, or strive after, something; -- usually with to.
(v. i.) To hold out the appearance of being, possessing, or performing; to profess; to make believe; to feign; to sham; as, to pretend to be asleep.
Example Sentences:
(1) His anti-politics act may just be a shtick – pretending he's still on Have I Got News for You, satirising politics even though he's right at the centre of it – but it liberates him from the usual constraints.
(2) "Obviously [writers in translation] have a disadvantage and there's no sense pretending they don't, of being read in translation," said Gekoski.
(3) Tony Abbott pretended to support the renewable energy industry before the election but is now “launching a full-frontal attack” according to Labor’s environment spokesman Mark Butler.
(4) The Telegraph's secret taping of Cable and fellow Liberal Democrat ministers while pretending to be concerned constituents has raised eyebrows in some media quarters, but the newspaper has claimed a "clear public interest" defence for its actions.
(5) It is hard to tell who has really suffered, and who is only pretending.
(6) Respecting the frequency of invalidity this cancer pretends the second place among these diseases.
(7) When this parliament votes for another referendum as it inevitably will, thanks to the perpetual crutch that the Greens provide, let’s not pretend it reflects the will of the Scottish people, because it doesn’t.
(8) Non-doms could no longer pretend to live in Monaco while living in the UK for four working days a week.
(9) But equally, you’re ignoring how these people feel if you try and pretend they don’t feel their area is changing.
(10) Additionally, the Schmidt-Furlow investigators looked at instances where female interrogators had fondled prisoners, or pretended to splash menstrual blood upon them.
(11) Stewart Lee with a mask made of meat, pretending to be Canadian?
(12) Yes, there are other reasons why a boy might take a clock out of its casing & pretend he’d made it.
(13) It would be idle to pretend that Cameron doesn't have talents as a leader.
(14) Their leaders are charging round the country pretending they are going to get an overall majority, but in their heart of hearts they know it is not true, you can see it in their eyes.” The deputy prime minister, whose party has been in coalition with the Conservatives since 2010, said the next question for the public was “that since neither David Cameron or Ed Miliband are going to walk into Downing Street on their own, who is it the voters want at their side”.
(15) By pretending to ignore the scientific evidence, AquaBounty is doing readers a disservice.
(16) Pro-Europeans don't do themselves any favours by trying to pretend that it didn't happen.
(17) Indeed watching the prime minister singling out unemployed youngsters for uniquely punitive measures while pretending it is for their own good, cheered on by a gang of braying chums, it looks less like the behaviour of a national statesman and more like the petty vindictiveness of a schoolyard bully.
(18) And he must not pretend to be ignorant of the consequences of continuing to burn coal or take refuge in a "carbon cap" or some "target" for future emission reductions.
(19) During the collection of a one-hour spontaneous language sample from each child the experimenter pretended 20 times not to understand and asked, "What?"
(20) He would go around the communities and pretend to have a conversation with people but really his eyes were on the children playing," she says.
Sting
Definition:
(v. t.) Any sharp organ of offense and defense, especially when connected with a poison gland, and adapted to inflict a wound by piercing; as the caudal sting of a scorpion. The sting of a bee or wasp is a modified ovipositor. The caudal sting, or spine, of a sting ray is a modified dorsal fin ray. The term is sometimes applied to the fang of a serpent. See Illust. of Scorpion.
(v. t.) A sharp-pointed hollow hair seated on a gland which secrets an acrid fluid, as in nettles. The points of these hairs usually break off in the wound, and the acrid fluid is pressed into it.
(v. t.) Anything that gives acute pain, bodily or mental; as, the stings of remorse; the stings of reproach.
(v. t.) The thrust of a sting into the flesh; the act of stinging; a wound inflicted by stinging.
(v. t.) A goad; incitement.
(v. t.) The point of an epigram or other sarcastic saying.
(v. t.) To pierce or wound with a sting; as, bees will sting an animal that irritates them; the nettles stung his hands.
(v. t.) To pain acutely; as, the conscience is stung with remorse; to bite.
(v. t.) To goad; to incite, as by taunts or reproaches.
Example Sentences:
(1) He's called out for his lack of imagination in a stinging review by a leading food critic (Oliver Platt) and - after being introduced to Twitter by his tech-savvy son (Emjay Anthony) - accidentally starts a flame war that will lead to him losing his job.
(2) I preferred the Times version, as my father would have done had he any interest in Sting.
(3) His words earned a stinging rebuke from first lady Michelle Obama , but at a Friday rally in North Carolina he said of one accuser, Jessica Leeds: “Yeah, I’m gonna go after you.
(4) In 31 patients in whom specific IgE fell to low (less than 6% counts bound) or unmeasurable levels, immunotherapy was discontinued, and sting challenge was carried out 1 to 3 years later.
(5) Colleagues involved in similar Telegraph stings this week included Michael Moore, the Scottish secretary, Ed Davey, a business minister, and Steve Webb, the pensions minister.
(6) Leading figures including the musician Sting, business tycoon Sir Richard Branson and comedian Russell Brand have called for the possession of drugs to be decriminalised.
(7) "It wouldn't have covered the costs but it would have taken the sting out of what I'd spent," he says.
(8) Moderate to severe SRs were equally likely after stings of yellow jacket, white-faced hornet, and yellow hornet (65%), honeybee (67%), or wasp (70%), although historical SRs were reported more often after stings of yellow jacket, white-faced hornet, or yellow hornet (30%) than after honeybee (19%) or wasp (14%) stings.
(9) Dramatic cases of hymenoptera stings have been reported from various sources for several years now.
(10) We can expect a greater number of toxic reactions related to multiple stings in addition to the more familiar allergic (IgE-mediated) reactions.
(11) Insect sting challenge in 14 patients with urticarial reaction to last insect sting resulted in two systemic reactions (95% confidence limits 0-6 patients), a reaction rate of 14%.
(12) Those patients who were re-stung within 2 weeks (anergic period) or over 5 years after a generalized reaction to a sting had significantly improved response.
(13) We review the reported cases at our institution with all types of bites and stings.
(14) A frequent cause of contact urticaria is skin exposure to the common stinging nettle (Urtica dioica).
(15) "We're trying to get Sting to wear a Pussy Riot T-shirt at his concert tonight," he'd told me the day before.
(16) 62 patients who had been stung by a red scorpion were admitted from January to December 1990: 18 with hypertension, 15 with supraventricular tachycardia, 11 with pulmonary oedema, and 18 with local pain at the site of sting but no systemic involvement.
(17) The standards committee report by a cross-party group of MPs said it "deplored" stings but would "not hesitate to act in such cases if wrongdoing had occurred".
(18) Sting – a man who had split the Police to pursue a more adult-oriented career, and who would in the following year ponder such poptastic issues as how much Russians loved their children and the plight of miners – took that job in 1984, while this year it falls to Guy Garvey, who may as well just change his middle name to 6Music.
(19) Also, the clinical pattern and treatment of the acute renal failure secondary to bee stings are discussed.
(20) Fifty nine patients (30%) with RXN3 responses to wasps failed to react to either test, while this applied to only 19 (6%) of the patients with RXN3 responses to bee stings.