Subj : Badly off
To   : Mike Powell
From : Gleb Hlebov
Date : Fri Jan 31 2025 10:55:22

Hi Mike,

Fri 24 Jan 2025 at 10:10, you wrote to me:

 >> "We'd been rather badly off for books", as far as I can see, is
 >> something along the lines of either
 >>     1: "We hadn't got enough money to afford buying books", or
 >>     2: "We had been having a shortage of books"
 MP> As an English speaker, I am not sure what they were trying to say
 MP> there - "we'd been rather badly off for books."  Your guesses are as
 MP> good as mine.  I would add that they could mean their "accounting
 MP> books," which might mean that they have fallen behind in their
 MP> payments or have fallen into debt.

I've checked and it turns out that "badly off" means the opposite of "well off", according to both M.-W. and Cambridge dictionaries. Seems like it's mostly british. So, #1 is a good guess still. :-)


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