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Reader question: Please explain "and then some", as in this sentence: We'll do everything in our power to help, and then some. My comments: "And then some", literally, means "AND THEN SOME more", something more, something in addition. In our example, this just shows the speaker means to say that they want to do everything they can to help. Your question is, when you've done everything, how can you do more? You cannot but I'm not here to nitpick. "And then some", you see, is an age-old idiom that has become a cliche. This means that sometimes people say it automatically, say it out of habit, say it just as a form of emphasis and you're not supposed to take it too seriously. For example, a hotel manager may boast that their rooms have everything you want and then some. No-one is going to take it word for word. I mean, nobody is going to pin the manager down and wangle out of him exactly what "and then some" stands for. I'm speaking metaphorically, of course, I don't mean anyone is pinning the manager down to the floor in the lobby. Well, at any rate, check out these media examples to see if you can take "and then some" verbatim or just metaphorically: 1. Common wisdom today tells us that timing the market doesn’t work. As hard as investors may try, earning massive profits by timing buy and sell orders around future market price movements is an elusive concept. | 
