Please relax on the grammar. There is genocide going on right now...in that light grammar slips can be forgiven.
There's a comedy skit out there, I think Carlin, that picks on English language pronunciations and how words that should rhyme don't. Wish I could find it. It fits nicely into this thread.
"Aks" rather than ask... 20-something girls who "uptalk" (their voice gets higher at the end of a sentence) Political "Talking Points" Blogojevich's hair Drivers who stop in a merge lane The HLN Headline News Loop! Pants below the buttocks!!! Shall I go on?
!!!!!! I thought I was the Lone Ranger when it comes to the "up talk" behavior. Agree, also, regarding those who decelerate in the acceleration lane. And no, I am not being culturally insensitive when I object to the pants hanging down... Unless you believe it is important to protect the cultural statement made by imitating penitentiary dress. --- My top "fingers on the chalkboard" grammatical error: those who cannot distinguish whether they should use "less," or "fewer." Also, remember: Mr. Comma lives inside the Quotation Mark House. He is comfortable there. It is where he belongs.
I'm holding out for "talk like a pirate" day when I can answer all ATC transmissions with "arrrrrrrrrrrrr."
I had an e-mail discussion with Dr. Brians about that subject some years ago. Particulary the issue of using the apostrophe on acronyms. Drives me nuts. touche And was it tarmac paving on which you were taxiing? Or was it concrete?
Pet peeve; flammable is not a word. Inflammable is the correct word. Source Strunk and White's "Elements of Style".
Pet peeves: 1. voicemail. I hate listening to someone drone on and on and not just get to the point and end the call. 2. I'm approaching a stop light and the car in the lane next to me decides that he wants to be first in line and pulls into my lane and stops for the red light. So now I have to brake even harder to keep from rear-ending him. 3. My 13 year-old daughter who will mosey at her own pace while I'm antsy, trying to get out the door on time. When she finally gets in the car THEN she gets anxious because she's going to be late for school.
I think some people think if you want to sound intelligent, you always use "I" instead of "me". It drives me batty to hear stuff like, "David went flying with Christy and I." But the one I REALLY hate is, "After the flight, David came to Christy and I's house".
I think they are both words. Flammable: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/flammable Inflammable: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/inflammable There a other references on-line for both, Marriam-Webster may be better accepted as a citation by most.
hey, sometimes it happens...I know I've stepped on broken stuff and someone had to have been there before me...
As a professional editor, I'm really impressed with all the grammarians here! So I'll add one of my language pet peeves: People who say they "could care less," when of course they mean the opposite.
Already covered... #52 Also, Which is worse: Being at the right place at the wrong time, the wrong place at the wrong time, the right place at the right time or the wrong place at the right time?
Merriam-Webster diagrees: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/flammable According to them "inflammable" has been a part of the language much longer, but "flammable" has been around since at least 1813. Edit: And I see I just stepped on someone's pet peeve from post #64!
One of the purposes of a trivial complaints thread is to make it easier to focus on more serious matters in all the other threads.
I never heard "I could care less" until recent decades; it was always "I couldn't care less" when I was young. My theory about how the former arose is that it may have started with people saying "as if I could care less," and later got shortened to "I could care less."
A southern red-neck was admitted to Harvard and was trying to find the library. He walked up to another student and asked, "Where's the library at?" The other student sniffed, "At Harvard we never end a sentence in a preposition." to which the red-neck replied, "OK, so where's the library at, ****ole!" Something like that?
In answer to which, we have the famous saying attributed to Winston Churchill: "This is the sort of English up with which I will not put." http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/nonerrors.html
No. In a college writing class I had I took comfort in the phrase "poetic license". Basically, it means you can do and say anything you want, any way you want.
My time to vent........................... 1- On a tv interview,,, the host asked questions, the guest answers, at the end of the interview the host says thank you,,, the guest should say "you are welcome",, but they don't. they all say (thank you).. WTF 2- Tv reports on a crime and says the criminal pleaded guilty... They PLED guilty.......... 3- mostly overseas reporters but some here do.....Person was injured and taken to hospital....... The correct way is the person ( was) taken to (the) hospital..
"So who are you going to go to the dance with?" "Never end a sentence with a preposition." "Sorry, so, who are you going to the dance with, bitch?"
I always assumed the guest was grateful for the TV exposure. I hear a lot of differences in English usage on British TV. What's considered correct there may differ from what's considered correct here.
British people don't say THE hospital, just "to hospital" or "in hospital". I lived there for years too, just differences in English. British people also put the period at the complete end of the sentence, whereas Americans put quotation marks after the period. They also pronounce the letter Z as "zed". Just some things that popped into my head.
I've always wanted to be on a jury to see if lawyers really ask questions the way they do on TV. Lawyer: "Is it not true that you murdered your spouse?" Suspect: "No!!!!" They just confessed! No, it is Not true = yes, I killed my spouse. The answer should be "Yes, it is not true."
