Spanish language Q&A Forum

Hello,

I noticed that oler seems to be sometimes built with the preposition "a" before introducing the smell of something, such as in:

Tú hueles a perfume fresco. 

or

Las galletas huelen a chocolate.

So I thought it was used in the meaning of "smelling like something", when the subject themselves smells like something. But then I also noticed it in ¿Vosotros oléis a pollo quemado?".

So is the "a" used rather when the smell has no article? What is the rule (if any)?

Thank you!

In the sentence below, wouldn't be correct to use 'tenemos' instead of 'tengamos'? Muchas gracias!

. Por otro lado, es genial que a los dos nos encanten la música y el deporte y que tengamos muchos amigos en común.

How do we know when to use El pretérito perfecto progresivo vs El indefinido progresivo?

when you ask a question like “do you offer discounts” there is no indication you are asking one or many people. so do i assume “you” will always be more than one person?

really enjoyable seeing the action described so clearly

The difference between an "event still to happen" and one that "will happen" can be determined only by the ability to predict the future. It is not a grammatical issue. So neither the indicative nor subjunctive choice is grammatically incorrect. It's a semantic difference, not a grammatical one. I've seen you make very different choices -- different from what I thought was meant. 

Many years ago in a Mexican Spanish school I was taught that in a sentence like.  No creo que Susana venga/haya venido hoy only those 2 options are correct. The imperfect and pluperfect subjunctive are only used if the verb in the main clause is in a past tense. There seems to be disagreement on this topic. What does RAE say?  Is there regional variation on this topic?

Hello, I'm slightly confused with the following:

As you can see from the previous examples, when we use deber with this nuance of assumption/wondering, we can optionally use the preposition "de" after deber.

So you are saying that "de" is truly optional and has the same meaning whether "de" is used or not?

Thank you,
Dave

I had searched for “Subjunctive” and came across something entitled “It’s complicated explaining the Subjunctive”. It seemed to be what I was looking for, so I clicked on it. However, I was taken to a lesson on facíl/difícil. Can you correct the link? Basically, I’m trying to mover beyond the long list of situations requiring the mood, and understand the underlying principle(s). Somewhere I saw an article making a distinction between the informational and the intentional. Would you have any references covering this question?   Thanks very much.  John Nolan