Wait vs Expectation - What's the difference?
wait | expectation |
To delay movement or action until the arrival or occurrence of; to await. (Now generally superseded by "wait for".)
* Dryden
* 1992 , (Hilary Mantel), A Place of Greater Safety , Harper Perennial 2007, p. 30:
To delay movement or action until some event or time; to remain neglected or in readiness.
* (John Milton)
* (John Dryden)
*
, title=(The Celebrity), chapter=4
, passage=No matter how early I came down, I would find him on the veranda, smoking cigarettes, or otherwise his man would be there with a message to say that his master would shortly join me if I would kindly wait .}}
(US) To wait tables; to serve customers in a restaurant or other eating establishment.
(obsolete) To attend on; to accompany; especially, to attend with ceremony or respect.
* Dryden
* Rowe
(obsolete) To attend as a consequence; to follow upon; to accompany.
(obsolete) To defer or postpone (a meal).
A delay.
An ambush.
* Milton
(obsolete) One who watches; a watchman.
(in the plural, obsolete, UK) Hautboys, or oboes, played by town musicians.
(in the plural, archaic, UK) Musicians who sing or play at night or in the early morning, especially at Christmas time; serenaders; musical watchmen. [formerly waites, wayghtes.]
* (rfdate)
* (rfdate)
The act or state of expecting or looking forward to an event as about to happen.
*
*:“A tight little craft,” was Austin’s invariable comment on the matron;. ¶ Near her wandered her husband, orientally bland, invariably affable, and from time to time squinting sideways, as usual, in the ever-renewed expectation that he might catch a glimpse of his stiff, retroussé moustache.
That which is expected or looked for.
*{{quote-book, year=1922, author=(Michael Arlen), title=
, passage=And so it had always pleased M. Stutz to expect great things from the dark young man whom he had first seen in his early twenties?; and his expectations had waxed rather than waned on hearing the faint bruit of the love of Ivor and Virginia—for Virginia, M. Stutz thought, would bring fineness to a point in a man like Ivor Marlay,
The prospect of the future; grounds upon which something excellent is expected to occur; prospect of anything good to come, especially of property or rank.
*1816 , (Jane Austen), , Vol.1 Ch.7:
*:Emma was not sorry to be pressed. She read, and was surprized. The style of the letter was much above her expectation . There were not merely no grammatical errors, but as a composition it would not have disgraced a gentleman; the language, though plain, was strong and unaffected, and the sentiments it conveyed very much to the credit of the writer. It was short, but expressed good sense, warm attachment, liberality, propriety, even delicacy of feeling. She paused over it, while Harriet stood anxiously watching for her opinion, with a "Well, well," and was at last forced to add, "Is it a good letter? or is it too short?"
The value of any chance (as the prospect of prize or property) which depends upon some contingent event.
(lb) The first moment; the long-run average value of a variable over many independent repetitions of an experiment.
(lb) The arithmetic mean.
The leaving of a disease principally to the efforts of nature to effect a cure.
As an adjective wait
is far.As an adverb wait
is far.As a noun expectation is
the act or state of expecting or looking forward to an event as about to happen.wait
English
Alternative forms
* (l)Verb
(en verb)- Awed with these words, in camps they still abide, / And wait with longing looks their promised guide.
- The Court had assembled, to wait events, in the huge antechamber known as the Œil de Boeuf.
- They also serve who only stand and wait .
- Haste, my dear father; 'tis no time to wait .
- He chose a thousand horse, the flower of all / His warlike troops, to wait the funeral.
- Remorse and heaviness of heart shall wait thee, / And everlasting anguish be thy portion.
- to wait dinner
Usage notes
* In sense 1, this is a catenative verb that takes the to infinitive . SeeSynonyms
* (delay until event) hold one's breathDerived terms
* can't wait * wait staff * wait state * wait for * wait on * wait tables * waiter * waiting room * waitperson * waitress * waitronNoun
(en noun)- I had a very long wait at the airport security check.
- They laid in wait for the patrol.
- an enemy in wait
- (Halliwell)
- Hark! are the waits abroad?
- The sound of the waits , rude as may be their minstrelsy, breaks upon the mild watches of a winter night with the effect of perfect harmony.
Statistics
*expectation
English
Noun
(en noun)“Piracy”: A Romantic Chronicle of These Days, chapter=Ep./1/1