About idiots

That was interesting for me to know what the word ИДИОТ originally meant – a person who is concerned with their own business rather than public affairs, politics, etc. (and some politicians are called idiots?) which in Greece was not really a good quality, so it acquired a negative meaning, as in these words, usually attributed to Putin:

hard to talk to the deaf, show the truth to the blind and argue with idiots

About home

It’s strange but in Russian we have the same word for house and home – ДОМ. In certain context it’s possible to distinguish between them:

Я иду домой – I am going home

Я иду в дом – I am going inside the house (for example from the garden)

So, if we use Accusative with a preposition (second option), that’s more about building itself and house. Just the noun alone – more about home.

Я дома – I am home

Я в доме – I am inside the house

Again, if we use here Prepositional with a preposition (second option), that’s more about building itself and house. Just the noun alone – more about home.

Compare:

В доме 5 этажей – There are 5 floors in the house (building).

(У нас) дома 5 этажей – (In our) home there are 5 floors.

The second is more about oligarchs!

Road home – the most desired way (Source: demotes.ru)

Dear (to a woman), I am home!

Sometimes they are interchangeable:

Word-for-word: to command in house (at home) must somebody one (Only one person must command at home) (Source: demotivatorium.ru) – the funny bit is that ОДНА in Russian applies only to women!

СЕЙЧАС vs ТЕПЕРЬ

There  is some confusion with these words – both words will be “now” in English. Many Russian native speakers would even struggle to explain the difference even though they use them correctly on subconscious level.

СЕЙЧАС (*СИЧАС) means “now” without any reference to the past, and

ТЕПЕРЬ (*ТИПЕРЬ) means something like “… while now” as opposed to the past: we had something in the past but ТЕПЕРЬ we…

Sometimes the difference is not quite clear but if you let’s say compare it with how (different!) it was in the past, better say ТЕПЕРЬ.

Please  compare:

Сейчас я пишу книги – Now I write books

Теперь я пишу книги-  Now I write books but in the past wrote articles or did something else

Сейчас много говорят о политике – Now they speak much about politics

Теперь много говорят о политике – Now they speak more about politics than before

So, СЕЙЧАС in the examples above  can replace ТЕПЕРЬ but it will loose its reference to the past. To retain the reference and СЕЙЧАС, we would need to create a special context:

Раньше я был банкиром, а сейчас пишу книги – I earlier was (used to be) a banker but now write books

But sometimes ТЕПЕРЬ cannot replace СЕЙЧАС at all, because often СЕЙЧАС is used for future without reference to the past:

Я сейчас напишу тебе письмо – I will write you a letter now (no reference to the past, so ТЕПЕРЬ would not make sense)

Я купил квартиру и теперь буду жить отдельно – I have bought a flat and will now live separately (here ТЕПЕРЬ is used for future but there is connection with the past!)

So, whenever you are talking about present/future and link it (compare it) with the past, go for ТЕПЕРЬ.

And for dessert (why do we use ТЕПЕРЬ and what word helps us make the choice?):

(Word for word) New design: now in 2 times less of crashes