intense / intensive The meanings of intense and intensive overlap considerably, but the two
adjectives often have distinctive meanings. When you describe human
feeling or activity, intense often suggests a strength or concentration that
arises from inner dispositions and is particularly appropriate for describing
emotional states: intense pleasure, dislike, loyalty, and so forth. But you
use intensive when the strength or concentration of an activity is imposed
from without: intensive bombing, intensive training, intensive marketing.
Thus a reference to Mark’s intense study of German suggests that Mark
himself was responsible for the concentrated activity, whereas Mark’s
intensive study of German suggests that the program in which Mark was
studying was designed to cover a great deal of material in a brief period.
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interface The noun interface has been around since the 1880s, meaning “a surface
forming a common boundary, as between bodies or regions.” But the word
did not really take off until the 1960s, when it began to be used in the
computer industry to designate the point of interaction between a computer
and another system, such as a printer. The word was applied to other
interactions as well—between departments in an organization, for example,
or between fields of study. Shortly thereafter interface developed a use as
a verb, but it never really caught on outside its niche in the computer world,
where it still thrives. The Usage Panel has been unable to muster much
enthusiasm for the verb. Thirty-seven percent accept it when it designates
the interaction between people in the sentence The managing editor must

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its / it’s Its is the possessive form of the pronoun it and is never written with an
apostrophe: The cat licked its paws. The contraction it’s (for it is or it has)
always has an apostrophe: It’s the funniest show I’ve seen in years.
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lack You normally use the verb lack in the sense of “to be wanting or deficient”
as the present participle with in: You will not be lacking in support from me.
When you use lack in the sense “to be in need of something,” you often use
for with it: “In the terrible, beautiful age of my prime,/I lacked for sweet linen
but never for time” (E.B. White)
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late

If the late director of your glee club did a superb job, don’t say so in public,
for late can mean “having recently left office” or “having recently died.” If
the director is still alive, use former instead; it will ensure that you create no
embarrassing misunderstanding

from disturbing or interfering.” A majority of the Usage Panel in an earlier
survey approved the following examples: Leave him alone and he will
produce. Left alone, he was quite productive. Those who do not accept
these examples generally feel that leave alone
should mean simply “to
depart from someone who remains in solitude”: They were left alone in the
wilderness
Remember, however, that in standard usage you cannot use the simple
verb leave as a substitute for let in the sense “to allow or permit.” Thus in
the following examples you can only use let: Let me be. Let him go. Let us
not quarrel. Let it lie
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lifestyle When lifestyle became popular a generation ago, some people objected to
it as voguish and superficial, perhaps because it appeared to elevate habits
of consumption, dress, and recreation to categories in a system of a social
classification. But the word has stayed with us, if only because such
categories figure importantly in the schemes that Americans commonly
invoke when explaining social values and behavior, as in “an
anticonventional lifestyle is no sure sign of feminist politics, or indeed, of
any politics at all” (Rachel Brownstein). The Usage Panel accepts the word,
but more so when the context requires a term that implies categorization
based on habits of consumption. Thus 53 percent of the Usage Panel
accepts the word in Bohemian attitudes toward conventional society have
been outstripped and outdated by the lifestyles of millions of young people.
But 70 percent accept the word in Salaries in the Bay Area may be higher,
but it may cost employees as much as 30 percent more to maintain their