Newsgroup: it.cultura.linguistica.inglese
Titolo: Ready to go.. or not

Ciao a tutti..
Oggi  ho googlato "ready for going" e ho ottenuto con grande sorpresa
più di mezzo milione di risultati - alcuni esempi: Getting Ready For
Going Full Time, I'm trying to prepare myself and the baby for going
back to work, how long do you take to get ready for going out? -
Queste frasi alle mie orecchie suonano tutte male e personalmente non
avrei dubbi ad usare "to go", ma vorrei capire se "ready for going" è
grammaticalmente scorretto, solo linguisticamente poco elegante o
un'alternativa valida che magari ha una sfumatura diversa da "to go"..

 un'alternativa valida che magari ha una sfumatura diversa da "to go"..
Di solito si direbbe 'to go' ma infatti 'for going' pu� avere una 
sfumatura diversa anche se non sia rettamente corretto.
Negli esempi che hai scritto il 'going' pu� essere considerato una parte 
di un'espressione distinta. Provo a spiegare la differenza sottile.
Si pu� dire "I'm getting ready for the hot summer." Tutto bene, no? 
Capiamo che cos'� l'estate calda. L'estate calda � una espressione 
consueta. Allora, 'going-full-time' � anche una espressione consueta. 
Going-out � anche un'espressione consueta. Going-back-to-work, meno 
cos�. Ma, se si ha scritto "I'm trying to prepare myself and the baby to 
go back to work" ha una sfumatura diversa nel senso che il significato � 
ambiguo perch� il 'to go' succede dopo 'the baby'. Ma chi constringe un 
bambino da fare lavoro? Invece, si preparano se stesso e il bambino per 
l'evento di going-back-to-work che tocca anche il bambino.
Anche 'to go out' ha una sfumatura diversa da 'going out' nel esempio.
How long do you take to get ready for going out?
How long do you take to get ready to go out?
Si pu� 'go out to the store' ma dire 'for going out' implica che � una 
serata di divertimento. Allora ci vuole 5 minuti per prepararsi a andare 
al negozio, ma un'ora per prepararsi a uscire.
Non dico che usando il gerundo � corretto ma � un tipo di stenografia, 
invece di dire "I'm trying to prepare myself and the baby for when I go 
back to work."

 back to work."
Grazie mille Tony, molto chiaro :)

 How long do you take to get ready to go out?
Grazie mille per l'esauriente risposta, Tony.
Potresti spiegarmi meglio la differenza tra le due frasi sopra?
Grazie ancora!

 Potresti spiegarmi meglio la differenza tra le due frasi sopra?
I don't want to encourage you to use substandard English, but I can try 
to help you understand why an English speaker may slip into a 
substandard shorthand for the purpose of communicating quickly a more 
elaborate meaning.
There are levels of connotation of a utterance that we understand from 
the many ways we have heard the utterance during our life. The utterance 
'going out' is one that is used so often, in a few different ways, that, 
depending on the context, it can stand out as having specific 
connotations beyond the simple literal meaning of the individual words.
"Is she really going out with him?"
It is possible for the above question to refer to whether a male and 
female are intending to leave a building together to go into the outside 
world. However, because 'going out' has a strong connotation of 'in an 
ongoing romantic relationship', an English speaker would not choose 
those words to ask the simple question of whether two people were about 
to step outside. Most English speakers reading the above sentence, even 
without a context, would expect that the person was asking if the two 
people were romantically involved. It could be said without the 
expectation that they were intending to leave their seated positions on 
the living room sofa.
If only an individual is involved, "going out" can mean that one is 
intending to participate in an evening of entertainment for which one 
might prepare by dressing in a way appropriate for the venue. For 
example, one might shave thoroughly with a straight razor and choose to 
put on a garishly colored acetate shirt to attend a disco dance club 
(and hope that there is never a fire).
So, an English speaker has all of these different connotations in his or 
her head when speaking, and (we hope) chooses the words that best convey 
the intention of the question.
If one wants to know how much time you require to prepare for an evening 
out that involves a possible romantic relationship, or a party, or some 
significant social event, one might say the following.
"How long do you take to get ready to go out for a social event?" Or, 
the lazy person might ask "How long do you take to get ready for going out?"
To ask "How long do you take to get ready go out?" can mean the same 
thing, but it is ambiguous because "to go out" is used very often in 
other generic contexts, so the connotation of 'romantic relationship' or 
'evening of entertainment' is much weaker. The response to this question 
may be "that depends on where I'm going."
I need to stop writing now.