Using ばかり to mean 'nothing but'.

[dhoggan]

Hi there!

It's my first post, so I hope this is the right forum; if not just send me packing

I'm going through a depressing amount of revision for the JLPT and have a question on the correct way to create sentences using ばかり to mean 'nothing but'. I'm pretty happy that it takes the form of [verb (て)] + ばかり + いる, but what confuses me is it's use on する verbs. I've seen it used as [verb part] + ばかり している - in other words coming before the する。So, of the two examples below, which one would be considered correct?

最近、仕事で運転ばかりしている。
最近、仕事で運転してばかりいる。

Many thanks,

Dave

[markystar]

by the way, bakari is mentioned in older lessons (but i couldn't find many with tags...)
but these two had them:

http://www.japanesepod101.com/2007/05/2 ... r-drill-2/
http://www.japanesepod101.com/2006/02/1 ... meet-yoko/

in december and january we're covering them:
2007-12-13 "Quitters" (Lower Intermediate)
2008-01-24 "Making the Rug Rats Read" (Lower Intermediate Season 2)



that said, to use bakari with suru (does nothing but..., does only)

i use this sentence to remind me:

芝刈りばかりする
しばかりばかりする
mowing the lawn only - i do → I only do mowing the lawn.
I only mow the lawn.
I do nothing but mow the lawn.
it's such an oyaji gag, but it works for me.

the last verb is the one that controls all earlier verbs, so....

now, to answer your question directly...
最近、仕事で運転ばかりしている is correct
these days, i'm always just driving at work (and nothing else).

i'm pretty sure that separating the して and いる you create 2 separate states of being, and this case looks odd to me.

can anyone else back me up on this?

[dhoggan]

Thanks for the information.

The best .PDF I found was Intermediate Lesson 10 which discusses ばかり with the て form, but nothing specifically about する. When I did a Google, I saw ばかり both before and after する so was getting very confused.

Regards,

Dave

[Joey]

Not sure if this is exactly what you are looking for but there is some information about Bakari on Tae Kim's Japanese Grammar Guide http://www.guidetojapanese.org/amount.html#part5

[Javizy]

Speaking of ばかり, I came across a structure yesterday used to express the sole reason for something.

～たばかりに

うっかりしゃべったばかりに大変な騒ぎになってしまった。
There was an uproar just because I spoke carelessly.