Ich will nur sagen...

[PitaBread]

...frohe und föhliches Weihnachten! Sag mir auf Englisch bescheid, was du heute zum Weihnachten machst. Freifühlen, Teile davon auf Deutsch einzugeben, wenn es dir hilft.

As for me, I'm just having a chilled out (relaxed; in diesem Kontext, ein entspannender Tag) day at home, until I go see my folks (Eltern; Familien) in the evening. I got pretty drunk (betrunken oder noch schlechteres xD) last night! Hah. Not all that hungover, just feeling a bit on the weak side. xD I'll say it again in English: happy Christmas.

I know what you're probably thinking: why not merry? Well, some people say happy. To be happy is to be merry, more or less. 8P

[tiorthan]

...frohe und fröhliche Weihnachten!

In German we usually just say "Fröhliche Weihnachten" or "Frohes Fest", but that's probably not what needs explanation here.

What the dictionary don't tell you, when you look up "Weihnachten" and find out that it's grammatical gender is neuter, is: Our festive greeting goes back to an old Plural of "Weihnacht" which has survived in the Phrase "Fröhliche Weihnachten".

Even though grammatically there's nothing wrong with "fröhliches Weihnachten" I've never heard any German native speaker use it.

Sag mir auf Englisch bescheid, was du heute zu Weihnachten machst.

We use "Bescheid sagen" mainly in two ways in German.

- to inform or notify someone of something that concerns them, so in most cases it's informing about an appointment, event or forwarding information
- to give someone a piece of your mind (usually rendered as "gehörig Bescheid sagen")

Du kannst gerne auch Teile davon auf Deutsch schreiben, wenn es dir hilft.

We don't have a direct translation for "feel free". I suppose, if you'd said "Fühl dich frei" most people would have guessed correctly what you mean but it's just not a phrase we use in German.

The correction I used also has consequences later in the sentence because you no longer have an Infinitiv mit zu (to infinitive).

But I also changed "eingeben" to "schreiben". Technically, "eingeben" would have worked as well, but it doesn't sound quite right. This is rather difficult to explain because it has a lot to do with how we learn to categorize actions. It's on par with explaining why and when you say "on a bus" in English and not "in a bus". In short, we use "eingeben" when we focus on the action of typing on a computer. As soon as other aspects of the action (the contents for example, or the purpose) become more important though, other words are used.


I'm sick, so I had to cancel all my plans and I've spent the last few days getting better and I plan on continuing that today.

[PitaBread]

Ich bin sehr dankbar für deine Hilfe! It was really useful.

I learned bescheid sagen a long time ago while chatting to a German friend, but it was always in the context of letting him know something, so as to inform, such as when I'm ready to play a game or something, so that explains a lot! I've taken notes of what you explained, as I do a lot. xD

I'm not sure I understand what you mean with Weihnachten, however, but I definitely screwed up that fröhliche, for some reason, and I dunno how I forgot to type the r. Hah. I'm guessing the original phrase of wishing somebody a merry Christmas has a definitive article in it which would make it fröhliche. I didn't know about frohes Fest, so I'll take note of that as well!

That's a shame about feel free, because I love that phrase! It's so easy. Haha. Oh well. Maybe if enough people say it, it'll become a thing? I'll try to remember for next time, when I want to say feel free, I'll say they can gladly do something.

A nice big message and only one small line was relevant to the Thema, ... I hope you had a good new year's and a good Christmas.

[tiorthan]

What I meant with my comment about Weihnachten was, when you look up Weihnachten in the dictionary you'll find it listed as having neuter gender. So, if you just go by the dictionary you'd expect „fröhliches Weihnachten“.

However, the word listed in the dictionary, is not the one we use when we say „fröhliche Weihnachten“. That phrase is actually the plural of „fröhliche Weihnacht“ which is also used by some people.

I can say with certainty that there never was a definite article in the that phrase.