Which, close enough
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John Herrman, "The Online Marketplace That’s a Portal to the Future of Capitalism", New York Times Magazine, 5/3/2017:
Among the items I sent to my friend, on our modest budget: a laser pointer; 100-count “super strong” small magnets; a functioning violin; a spare part for the window mechanism on an Audi A6; a deep-V-neck sweater; and of course, the self-stirring mug. Shipping was often free, or only a dollar. The items were extraordinarily well reviewed, often by thousands of customers. The deals seemed, if not exactly too good to be true, at least economically unfeasible — which, close enough.
Michael Glazer, who sent in the link, commented:
Because, why not?
Indeed. For some background, see "Phrasally grateful", 10/8/2007, "Phrasal type shifting", 4/21/2013, and "Linking 'which' in Patrick O'Brian", 11/14/2003.
For lagniappe, from the web:
Even if you don't like red heads (which, why not?) this guy is hot.
Are you both parents? Nope. Just Nikki. Unless you count Jamie's dogs, which.. why not? She's fine if you think she's a weirdo for treating her dogs like children.
"No, no, no, you don't wanna ask the tough one…in the '75 fight, in the end the Mob was in the fight. A blind man knew that. And if they shot me they win all the marbles. So why not shoot the son of a bitch? Do you know it was, for me, I'm not exaggerating…I was never more scared in my life. I figured if they pump me out–which, why not, Whitey would be…they were crazy enough even then to do it to me–then they drew Gerry O'Leary as council president."
Saurs said,
May 8, 2017 @ 7:07 am
It's actually quite jarring in writing and when made conspicuous, but said aloud by and to native speakers, it appears to go by unnoticed and is therefore quite serviceable.
"Which" makes more sense to me — an elision of an unnecessary phrase, something like "to which my reaction is" or the dread quotative "I was like" but in the present tense — and is of a more middling, less polarizing register than the cutesy "because [reasons]" construction.
KevinM said,
May 8, 2017 @ 10:19 am
@Saurs. Perhaps an elision of "in which case, my question to you is …"
Mick O said,
May 8, 2017 @ 3:14 pm
The linked classic from 2003 closes with the devious teaser "the interesting truth about some strange uses of mere in O'Brian's books, however, as I'll explain tomorrow :-)…"
I clicked through to the next day, and the next, and the next, and the next after that. I found more delightful discussions of O'Brian that I'd never been exposed to, but I never found the entry on O'Brian's mere…
Alyssa said,
May 8, 2017 @ 7:55 pm
I don't think it's an elision of a longer phrase. My theory is that it's an expansion of the common use of "which" to introduce an aside. Think of sentences like "Susan drove by in her new car, which she would lose five years later in a poker game, and waved at us" or "I sent her a card and a gift, which of course is expected on such an occasion, but I didn't attend myself". The "which" is there for syntactic reasons, of course, but it's such a common pattern that I can see how some of the "going off on a tangent" meaning would rub off on it.
Rodger C said,
May 9, 2017 @ 11:12 am
Alyssa, I agree. My students struggling with high-register English often use "which" in just such a sense. "I sprained my knee, which I fell off the porch."
Ben Zimmer said,
May 9, 2017 @ 11:20 am
In a Twitter discussion of the innovative use of "because" a few years ago, I brought up the usage of "which" followed by "yeah"/"whatever"/"of course", etc.
I also mentioned the usage in an interview for Chicago Manual of Style Shop Talk:
John Stone said,
May 11, 2017 @ 8:19 pm
This isn't some exotic usage, it's simply an ellipsis for "if you think about it":
The deals seemed, if not exactly too good to be true, at least economically unfeasible — which, if you think about it, is close enough.