# For heaven's sake, people, you're authors.



## David VanDyke (Jan 3, 2014)

Wordsmithing is your trade.

It's "Yea or nay," not "Yay or nay."

You sit for a while, not for awhile.

You try to write every day, not everyday.

Etc.

Feel free to add your own.


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## Guy Riessen (Mar 27, 2016)

David VanDyke said:


> Wordsmithing is your trade.
> 
> It's "Yea or nay," not "Yay or nay."


No, I'm pretty sure it's "Hay or Neigh," man.


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## Patty Jansen (Apr 5, 2011)

piqued my interest, not peaked or peeked

And for crying out loud, learn how to use an apostrophe.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

David VanDyke said:


> Wordsmithing is your trade.
> 
> It's "Yea or nay," not "Yay or nay."
> 
> ...


What are you trying to say? Out with it!

Ok, it is not action pact; it is action packed.

It is not shuttered, it is shuddered.

It is free rein, not free reign.

These are just a few I have come across recently.


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## Lydniz (May 2, 2013)

Please stop getting "off of" things.


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## Lydniz (May 2, 2013)

Doglover said:


> It is free rein, not free reign.


I have terrible trouble with this one. I know the difference but have to stop and think about it every time.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Lydniz said:


> Please stop getting "off of" things.


Oh, Lord, yes. And please, please, it is 'fed up WITH' not fed up of. It is 'I would HAVE' not I would of.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Lydniz said:


> I have terrible trouble with this one. I know the difference but have to stop and think about it every time.


Well give it some context, then it's easy. 'I gave the horse free rein and he found his way home'.

What about past and passed? I know the noun is past, but as to the others... Anyone know this for certain? He went passed? He went past? I think the first one is right but the second one looks right. I try to avoid the word.


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## A.A (Mar 30, 2012)

I could of liked this post if it wasn't incinerating that my technical skills is lacking.



Doglover said:


> What about past and passed? I know the noun is past, but as to the others... Anyone know this for certain? He went passed? He went past? I think the first one is right but the second one looks right. I try to avoid the word.


"He passed" = correct.

"He went past" = correct.

"He went passed" = not correct.

You could remember it as "He passed wind" if you like . If it passes that test, then it passes without needing the 'went' before it


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## Evenstar (Jan 26, 2013)

Doglover said:


> Well give it some context, then it's easy. 'I gave the horse free rein and he found his way home'.


Ah, but I gave the king a free reign


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Evenstar said:


> Ah, but I gave the king a free reign


I've certainly never heard of that.


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## Colin (Aug 6, 2011)

I'm having difficulties talking today because I'm a little horse. 

My first camping experience was intents.

Ban shredded cheese packs and make America grate again.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

A.A said:


> I could of liked this post if it wasn't incinerating that my technical skills is lacking.
> 
> "He passed." = correct.
> 
> ...


Oh, Lord, now I'm even more confused. So 'he past' is wrong as well then?

When my daughter's private school closed down, one of the mother's told me about her son: 'he's had private intuition all this time; he's going to carry on having private intuition'.


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## A.A (Mar 30, 2012)

Doglover said:


> Oh, Lord, now I'm even more confused. So 'he past' is wrong as well then?
> 
> When my daughter's private school closed down, one of the mother's told me about her son: 'he's had private intuition all this time; he's going to carry on having private intuition'.


Yes, 'he past' is wrong. It's missing any information about what he did 'in the past'. You could say, 'he played guitar' in the past, for example.

Whereas if you say 'he passed' then you usually mean that he either died (passed away) or he went past (walked past, drove past, rode past) or he 'passed something' (passed wind, passed a kidney stone).

The mother's statement is technically correct.


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## alawston (Jun 3, 2012)

Definitely. Defiantly.

Not even vaguely similar.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

A.A said:


> Yes, 'he past' is wrong. It's missing any information about what he did 'in the past'. You could say, 'he played guitar' in the past, for example.
> 
> Whereas if you say 'he passed' then you usually mean that he either died (passed away) or he went past (walked past, drove past, rode past) or he 'passed something' (passed wind, passed a kidney stone).
> 
> The mother's statement is technically correct.


The word is tuition; not intuition.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

alawston said:


> Definitely. Defiantly.
> 
> Not even vaguely similar.


Oh, while we're on that subject - how many times do you read definately instead of definitely? I used to work with a girl who kept saying her little boy was very 'destructful'. I had to bite my tongue, as I never correct people's language in real life; it is ill mannered. But it did annoy me.


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## Desert Rose (Jun 2, 2015)

For all intensive purposes.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Dragovian said:


> For all intensive purposes.


I had a letter from an estate agent when I had my house up for sale. It declared with confidence that it was the only agent who could get me that 'illusive' sale. You can imagine my reply.

Oh, and it 'precede' to go before not proceed.


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## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

Doglover said:


> What are you trying to say? Out with it!
> 
> Ok, it is not action pact; it is action packed.
> 
> ...


I'm the first one to admit I'm having difficult trying to understand what you're pointing out in your first line...


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## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

Quiet and quite irritate me a lot. As in, I will yell at you to fix it because you come across as a complete idiot if you manage to mix the two up. I recently read a traditionally published book that had mixed up "waging" and "wanking," which caught me by surprise. Though I suppose anything or anybody "wanking" would.



Lydniz said:


> Please stop getting "off of" things.


Is this not more of an Americanism than something incorrect? I understand what you're pointing out here. It's an odd choice of words, especially if you're writing a romance... In America, we do say "he got off of his bicycle," as you don't stand up from it or step off of it.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Abalone said:


> Quiet and quite irritate me a lot. As in, I will yell at you to fix it because you come across as a complete idiot if you manage to mix the two up. I recently read a traditionally published book that had mixed up "waging" and "wanking," which caught me by surprise. Though I suppose anything or anybody "wanking" would.
> 
> Is this not more of an Americanism than something incorrect? I understand what you're pointing out here. It's an odd choice of words, especially if you're writing a romance... In America, we do say "he got off of his bicycle," as you don't stand up from it or step off of it.


I would associate the phrase with sloppy English, not American. Many people might say 'got off of' but an author wouldn't write it. Got off his bicycle would be much better.

My mother always used to say 'what you doing of?' instead of 'what are you doing?' I think this is similar.


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## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

Doglover said:


> I would associate the phrase with sloppy English, not American. Many people might say 'got off of' but an author wouldn't write it. Got off his bicycle would be much better.
> 
> My mother always used to say 'what you doing of?' instead of 'what are you doing?' I think this is similar.


Oh, yeah, I see what you mean now. Sorry, it's two in the morning here and, well, we just put the clocks an hour back. It's really three in the morning but the coffee and the bag of apples next to me is keeping me going. 

Wouldn't that count as a dialect issue? I tend to write characters who ride bikes in a different manner. They rarely get off their bicycles. Instead, they're hurled across their handlebars at breakneck speed and sometimes at risk of breaking their neck.

*sips coffee*


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Abalone said:


> Oh, yeah, I see what you mean now. Sorry, it's two in the morning here and, well, we just put the clocks an hour back. It's really three in the morning but the coffee and the bag of apples next to me is keeping me going.
> 
> Wouldn't that count as a dialect issue? I tend to write characters who ride bikes in a different manner. They rarely get off their bicycles. Instead, they're hurled across their handlebars at breakneck speed and sometimes at risk of breaking their neck.
> 
> *sips coffee*


Oh, yes. I'd use it in dialogue, but not in narrative. That's the difference. If I was basing a character on my mother, for instance, I would have her saying 'what you doing of?' She had some other very quirky phrases as well which no one who hadn't grown up with her would ever understand.


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## Decon (Feb 16, 2011)

Lydniz said:


> Please stop getting "off of" things.


Why? It's how people talk and immortalised in song, especially for dialogue or first person.

I says, Hey! You! Get off of my cloud
Hey! You! Get off of my cloud
Hey! You! Get off of my cloud
Don't hang around 'cause two's a crowd

Same if someone says. "Write me" which grammatically speaking means you should write down the word "me" but we would all know what is meant in the context of "Write to me" In the same way we use "email me" = "send an email to me."


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## Abigail Stark (Sep 5, 2016)

"Could care less" 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om7MFkmpw


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## Vale (Jul 19, 2017)

I remember transferring universities long ago and not having my basic English credit counted even though the 4000 level English courses were fine, so I took the class at a community college after work. One of the other people in the class asked me to look over all of his papers for him before he turned them in, and being a nice person*, I said sure. It went well for the first two, but on his third paper I crossed out "beckon call" and wrote "beck and call" next to it and it was like I had insulted his mother and told him Santa Claus wasn't real and his goldfish had died all in one.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

You can lead a horse to water, but you led him away later (not lead him away). 
I see this error so often in newspapers and magazines that I'm getting the impression that 'led' has fallen out of use  .


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Abigail Stark said:


> "Could care less"
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om7MFkmpw


Yep. And 'I missed not having...' I missed having would be the way; the other is just the opposite.


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## Vale (Jul 19, 2017)

Abigail Stark said:


> "Could care less"
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om7MFkmpw


As a small child I always used to say "I could care less.... but I'm not sure how." It seemed to have a visceral reaction with a lot of people (though it made sense in my head), so I've stopped saying it as an adult.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Vale said:


> I remember transferring universities long ago and not having my basic English credit counted even though the 4000 level English courses were fine, so I took the class at a community college after work. One of the other people in the class asked me to look over all of his papers for him before he turned them in, and being a nice person*, I said sure. It went well for the first two, but on his third paper I crossed out "beckon call" and wrote "beck and call" next to it and it was like I had insulted his mother and told him Santa Claus wasn't real and his goldfish had died all in one.


I was asked by a new writer on a facebook group to edit her book. She went off in a strop!


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Vale said:


> As a small child I always used to say "I could care less.... but I'm not sure how." It seemed to have a visceral reaction with a lot of people (though it made sense in my head), so I've stopped saying it as an adult.


That actually does make sense if you use the whole sentence. Never heard it before.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Please don't let the bride walk up the isle, people. 

As for off of, it's colloquial American, so I don't want to see it in a Regency romance, thank you very much.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

PaulineMRoss said:


> Please don't let the bride walk up the isle, people.
> 
> As for off of, it's colloquial American, so I don't want to see it in a Regency romance, thank you very much.


I think that comes under historical inaccuracy. I can't stand stories set in medieval times with modern names and people talking about having sex and other modern phrases. Oh, and a book where every man with a title lives in a castle.


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## Lydniz (May 2, 2013)

"Off of" is repeating yourself, as the "of" is already by implication included in the "off."


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## A Fading Street (Sep 25, 2016)

Some of the more common ones I see are old favourites like mixing up-
There, their, and they're.
Choose/chose
Loose/lose
Who's/whose
Peel/peal


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

A Fading Street said:


> Some of the more common ones I see are old favourites like mixing up-
> There, their, and they're.
> Choose/chose
> Loose/lose
> ...


I see loose instead of lose more times than I care to remember. But one that gets me is woman which is often mispelt as women or the other way round. Yet the writer knows man and men so I say, it is man with a womb.


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## Philip Gibson (Nov 18, 2013)

Do Americans really say, "He dove into the swimming pool"?

Seems really odd to me.


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## Colin (Aug 6, 2011)

Philip Gibson said:


> Do Americans really say, "He dove into the swimming pool"?
> Seems really odd to me.


He dove in to rescue the bar of Dove soap that dove out of his hands.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Philip Gibson said:


> Do Americans really say, "He dove into the swimming pool"?
> 
> Seems really odd to me.


I've never heard anyone say that. I would say dived in, but then I'm a Londoner!


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## unkownwriter (Jun 22, 2011)

Your going to have to bare with me, it takes alot of thought to remember all the wons that irritate me. There out their, but I'm not to good at recalling all of them. My brain is lose, and stuff falls out. But this thread has peeked my interest so I'm going too try too remember more.


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## ImaWriter (Aug 12, 2015)

The owner assured me her dog didn't bite, but the sight of those teeth made me _weary_.


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## Taking my troll a$$ outta here (Apr 8, 2013)




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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

I've just read about the exuberant prices people are charging.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

I published my masterpiece and I haven't had many _sells._


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## Vale (Jul 19, 2017)

Philip Gibson said:


> Do Americans really say, "He dove into the swimming pool"?
> 
> Seems really odd to me.


Yes, but it sorta goes both ways in the US depending on where you're at. It's like how "leapt" sounds normal, but "leaped" isn't something you'd never hear. "He dove in after his cell phone" sounds normal to me, but so is "Yesterday, when he dived in after his phone, he forgot his Kindle was in his back pocket." I think Grammar Girl or someone talked about it, but irregular past tenses have had a resurgence in the US, including some words that didn't originally have irregular past tenses. And again, depending on which section of which city in which state you live in, dove/dived could sound completely wrong. "Sneaked" for "snuck" is another one that sounds so wrong every time I hear it, but I check every irregular past tense so I know it's something that's common. I'm sure somewhere out there is an exciting map of all the words and how two cities side-by-side use different words for every thing.


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## A. N. Other Author (Oct 11, 2014)

I'm on tender tenterhooks to see how this turns out.


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## GeneDoucette (Oct 14, 2014)

"should of" instead of should have.

this makes me nuts.


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## A. N. Other Author (Oct 11, 2014)

Philip Gibson said:


> Do Americans really say, "He dove into the swimming pool"?
> 
> Seems really odd to me.


I've had one copy editor correct my "dived" to "dove" for 2 or 3 novels and when I had to use a different one she altered all my "dove" verbs to "dived."

Apparently "dove" is more commonly used in northern quarter of the United States with "dived" preferred almost everywhere else, and internationally. Both are technically correct but I prefer "dived." I haven't gone back to change everything previously, though. I may do one day.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

ADDavies said:


> I've had one copy editor correct my "dived" to "dove" for 2 or 3 novels and when I had to use a different one she altered all my "dove" verbs to "dived."
> 
> Apparently "dove" is more commonly used in northern quarter of the United States with "dived" preferred almost everywhere else, and internationally. Both are technically correct but I prefer "dived." I haven't gone back to change everything previously, though. I may do one day.


I think the upper classes of the English, like the royal family and the aristocracy, would use dove. Us common folk would use dived.


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

Abalone said:


> Wouldn't that count as a dialect issue? I tend to write characters who ride bikes in a different manner. They rarely get off their bicycles. Instead, they're hurled across their handlebars at breakneck speed and sometimes at risk of breaking their neck.


Who is hurling them across their handlebars? Or are they simply bad riders who pedaled madly into a tree?


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

Miniscule.  Is that as opposed to a maxiscule?

Putting someone through the "ringer". Really? Would that be your local church bell tower?


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## Gone 9/21/18 (Dec 11, 2008)

Patty Jansen said:


> And for crying out loud, learn how to use an apostrophe.


And when not to use one. If you refer to Mr. Smith's entire family, the plural of one Smith is Smiths (not Smith's).



Vale said:


> Yes, but it sorta goes both ways in the US depending on where you're at. It's like how "leapt" sounds normal, but "leaped" isn't something you'd never hear. "He dove in after his cell phone" sounds normal to me, but so is "Yesterday, when he dived in after his phone, he forgot his Kindle was in his back pocket."


Probably because I'm old, avoidance of irregular past tense sounds awkward, ugly, and usually wrong to me. More and more I see "the sun shined," and I'm waiting for "Jesus weeped."


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## ImaWriter (Aug 12, 2015)

My Dog's Servant said:


> Putting someone through the "ringer". Really? Would that be your local church bell tower?


That's actually a very common idiom where I live. At least with the older generation.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

My Dog's Servant said:


> Miniscule. Is that as opposed to a maxiscule?
> 
> Putting someone through the "ringer". Really? Would that be your local church bell tower?


A ringer is an old fashioned machine for squeezing the surplus water out of washing. My mum used to use one; it was a big thing with wooden rollers and a handle. In other words, putting someone through the ringer means to squeeze them dry.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

The apostrophe one really does pee me off. And I find it so easy. If it is not to replace a missing letter, if it is not belong to, it doesn't belong there.


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

Doglover said:


> A ringer is an old fashioned machine for squeezing the surplus water out of washing. My mum used to use one; it was a big thing with wooden rollers and a handle. In other words, putting someone through the ringer means to squeeze them dry.


No, it's a wringer. A wringer washer. As in "wring" or twist. Which is why you put someone through the wringer, not the ringer.

I had to use one years ago when I spent a summer working on a dude ranch. It was a big BIG step forward from a washboard and a bucket, but oh, my! what a lot of work! And dangerous, too.


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## crebel (Jan 15, 2009)

Doglover said:


> A ringer is an old fashioned machine for squeezing the surplus water out of washing. My mum used to use one; it was a big thing with wooden rollers and a handle. In other words, putting someone through the ringer means to squeeze them dry.


It is a "wringer", not a ringer. It wrings the water from the clothes.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

ImaWriter said:


> That's actually a very common idiom where I live. At least with the older generation.


I think the correct term is "through the wringer." As in, to wring something out by squeezing/twisting.



Doglover said:


> A ringer is an old fashioned machine for squeezing the surplus water out of washing. My mum used to use one; it was a big thing with wooden rollers and a handle. In other words, putting someone through the ringer means to squeeze them dry.


See above. Wringer instead of ringer.

As for quite/quiet, etc., I would like to think that something like that is just a simple typo. Typos are NOT the same thing as incorrect word usage.

"for all intensive purposes" .... Yeah, that one bothers me. Probably surprising (in a bad way) that a lot of people actually think [email protected] like that are correct.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

My Dog's Servant said:


> No, it's a wringer. A wringer washer. as in "wring" or twist.


Of course it is! I knew that. I'm 70 next month you know.


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## Abderian (Apr 5, 2012)

Doglover said:


> A ringer is an old fashioned machine for squeezing the surplus water out of washing. My mum used to use one; it was a big thing with wooden rollers and a handle. In other words, putting someone through the ringer means to squeeze them dry.


That would be a wringer.


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## Abderian (Apr 5, 2012)

Horde/hoard can be tricky, and loathe and loath to, which is a different word.


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## Vale (Jul 19, 2017)

When I hear "through the ringer" I always imagine a boxing match against an opponent much stronger and the bell going "ding ding!" between rounds.


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## Colin (Aug 6, 2011)

she-la-ti-da said:


> Your going to have to bare with me, it takes alot of thought to remember all the wons that irritate me. There out their, but I'm not to good at recalling all of them. My brain is lose, and stuff falls out. But this thread has peeked my interest so I'm going too try too remember more.


You kneed an editer!


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Abderian said:


> That would be a wringer.


Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt; don't rub it in.


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## ImaWriter (Aug 12, 2015)

My Dog's Servant said:


> No, it's a wringer. A wringer washer. As in "wring" or twist. Which is why you put someone through the wringer, not the ringer.


Given what this thread is about, the w/ringer should have been obvious. @Doglover, I'm very glad I wasn't the only one. 

Let me just add, I've actually seen an old wringer in action, and I'm incredibly thankful that isn't part of today's laundry tasks.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

I recently read a book set in England by an American who seemed to think our counties were similar to US states; that was very irritating. It also annoys me when a writer sets a book in England, but assumes the laws here are the same. They are not.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

ImaWriter said:


> Given what this thread is about, the w/ringer should have been obvious. @Doglover, I'm very glad I wasn't the only one.
> 
> Let me just add, I've actually seen an old wringer in action, and I'm incredibly thankful that isn't part of today's laundry tasks.


The fact that I remember my mother using one on a regular basis, along with the scrubbing board, gives me an excuse for getting it wrong! Nowadays, people use them as garden ornaments.


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

The really tricky ones are those you "think" you know, but don't, so you never bother checking.

Years ago I was flipping through my dictionary (look up one word, spend half an hour seeing what else you can find), and was startled to learn that "tandem" did not mean "two side-by-side" as I'd always thought, but, rather, one behind the other. Which means those twenty-mule teams that hauled borax out of the Mojave dessert in the late 1800s were tandem hitches. (I probably should have figured that out from "tandem bicycle", but I didn't.)

I sometimes wonder what I'm NOT learning by looking up words on the computer rather than "wasting" time getting lost in the dictionary.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Sue Ann C. said:


> A common error, even in newspapers and on TV: John Jones _hung_ himself. No, John Jones _hanged_ himself.
> 
> People are hanged, clothes are hung. (I'm not sure about animals though.)


Now that one really does pee me off, even more so as in an episode of Victoria, she actually said it. As if the Queen of England would make that mistake.

I always refer to my animals in books as though they are the same as humans, because they are to me. It would be 'a dog who' not 'a dog that'.

On that subject, it annoys me when I read a person being referred to as that. The man that did something.


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## Colin (Aug 6, 2011)

Shalini Boland said:


> dragged not _drug_ !!
> This thread reminds me of an IT Crowd episode - 'pedalstool', '*damp squid*' and 'ma love'


Have you ever encountered an undamp squid? Or an unsoggy octopus, for that matter...


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

Sue Ann C. said:


> A common error, even in newspapers and on TV: John Jones _hung_ himself. No, John Jones _hanged_ himself.


And every time I see it, I remember the very vulgar joke about the plastic surgeon...


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## Colin (Aug 6, 2011)

My Dog's Servant said:


> And every time I see it, I remember the very vulgar joke about the plastic surgeon...


The one where he stood in front of the fire and melted?


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Shalini Boland said:


> dragged not _drug_ !!
> 
> This thread reminds me of an IT Crowd episode - 'pedalstool', 'damp squid' and 'm'love'


I have never, ever during my many years of existence, seen drug instead of dragged.


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## ImaWriter (Aug 12, 2015)

Just thought of another that makes in insane. Bring instead of take, or vice versa.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Doglover said:


> Now that one really does pee me off, even more so as in an episode of Victoria, she actually said it. As if the Queen of England would make that mistake.
> 
> I always refer to my animals in books as though they are the same as humans, because they are to me. *It would be 'a dog who' not 'a dog that'.
> *
> On that subject, it annoys me when I read a person being referred to as that. The man that did something.


Aaarrrgh. The "who/that" thing is one of my biggest pet peeves. I saw a FB post from a major TV show and the text said "Character X is the one that did such-and-such." I couldn't help myself... I left a comment that said "Character X is the one WHO did.... I fixed it for you."

*Unrelated, as it's grammar, not spelling/incorrect word usage, but in a tradpubbed book I'm reading from the library--first in an ongoing series--was this line: "The Russian fawned over Rowena and I."     That one got by the author AND at least a couple of editors.

**even further unrelated, I've seen some people use the term trade-pub as opposed to trad-pub. I realize there is such a thing as a "trade paperback," but in the common usage on this board I believe that trad-pubbed is preferred, as it refers to _traditional_ publishing, as opposed to indie publishing. **

Now, back to your regularly-scheduled thread.....


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

Not to derail the thread (which is fun), but because it points out the value of checking your assumptions...

After my post about "tandem", I looked up "twenty-mule teams" and found this sentence...

"In 1877, six years before twenty-mule teams had been introduced into Death Valley, Scientific American reported that Francis Marion Smith and his brother had shipped their company's borax in a 30-ton load using two large wagons..."

My first thought was, the sentence was badly written, that it should have said "Scientific American reported that, in 1877, Francis Smith and his brother shipped..." 

But I decided to check and discovered that Scientific American is, in fact, the oldest continuously published monthly  magazine in the United States, having been founded in 1845. (though it only went monthly in 1921).  So...the writing was correct after all!


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Puddleduck said:


> *"less" when it should be "fewer"
> *
> I see that one SO much. I'm pretty sure 98% of the English speaking population doesn't even realize there's a difference or that the word "fewer" exists.


Ditto.


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

I have so many more, but I'm not aloud to say them here


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## Paranormal Kitty (Jun 13, 2017)

One thing I did that I was unaware of is the needed brushed, needed repaired, etc., construction. I had no idea this was incorrect. It sounds fine to me, but should be needs "to be" whatever instead. My brief research told me it's a dialect feature, but I don't have any connection to the region it was attributed to, so who knows.


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## Sailor Stone (Feb 23, 2015)

How about, “she waited with baited breath”? Instead of “bated”.
Also, “expresso” instead of “espresso”, although it is to the point now that expresso is used so much that it is now becoming acceptable.


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Paranormal Kitty said:


> One thing I did that I was unaware of is the needed brushed, needed repaired, etc., construction. I had no idea this was incorrect. It sounds fine to me, but should be needs "to be" whatever instead. My brief research told me it's a dialect feature, but I don't have any connection to the region it was attributed to, so who knows.


I've heard people say it, but it's not something I would ever use in narrative. I personally cannot stand it when people say 'my bad' and I hate the phrase 'pick your brains' - gives me a headache. But these are little idiosyncrasies of dialogue not mistakes.


----------



## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

Just spotted another one:  "rack and ruin"  when it should be    "wrack and ruin" 

Sadly, when I put "wrack" in for definition, Google's definition said it was a variant of "rack" or torture. Nope.

And then we wonder why so many get it wrong.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

My Dog's Servant said:


> Miniscule. Is that as opposed to a maxiscule?
> 
> Putting someone through the "ringer". Really? Would that be your local church bell tower?





Doglover said:


> A ringer is an old fashioned machine for squeezing the surplus water out of washing. My mum used to use one; it was a big thing with wooden rollers and a handle. In other words, putting someone through the ringer means to squeeze them dry.


But I think it is a wringer.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Kindergarden for Kindergarten


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## Spin52 (Sep 6, 2015)

ADDavies said:


> I'm on tender tenterhooks to see how this turns out.


I've always spelled it correctly, but only just learned the origin of the phrase while researching the blanket-making trade for background. In case anyone is interested, this comes from when blanket cloth -- lengths equivalent to about 24 blankets -- were stretched out and dried in the fields, hung from hooks on wooden 'tenter' frames. Hence, 'tenterhooks', and when it rained, as it often does in Oxfordshire, it was all hands on board to unhook them and bring the cloth inside quickly.
I also HATE the phrase 'from the get go'. What's wrong with 'from the start' or 'from the beginning'?


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

> It is not shuttered, it is shuddered.


I shuttered my house before the storm, but it still shuddered when the wind hit it. 

I've seen so many here that stop me cold when I'm reading. To/too, lose/loose, led/lead, of/have.

What really drives me nuts in my own writing are those things my fingers seem to type even though my mind knows what is correct.

waste/waist, wave/waive, who's/whose, it's/its -- I've learned to do a search on both sides of those before I send an MS to my editor. I'm tired of being laughed at.


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## Decon (Feb 16, 2011)

Doglover said:


> A ringer is an old fashioned machine for squeezing the surplus water out of washing. My mum used to use one; it was a big thing with wooden rollers and a handle. In other words, putting someone through the ringer means to squeeze them dry.


Wringer


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## Debbie Bennett (Mar 25, 2011)

_Bare with me. _I'd love too - wait - let me get naked ...


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

May I note, for the record, that KBoards is an informal site. So if people make typos or inadvertently misspell words, it is Not Done to draw attention to it and criticize.

Obviously, in a more formal sort of writing -- as I would expect to see in something published by someone who considers themselves a professional and expects people to pay for the thing -- one should absolutely be aware of these easy mistakes and try NOT to make them.

And, yeah, there are a number of phrases/words here that people are objecting to that are accepted slang, or local usage, and perfectly acceptable in most cases.


----------



## renamed (Nov 27, 2015)

Apostrophe abuse. It's  E V E R Y W H E R E. *cries*


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## kspen (Aug 12, 2017)

Using "begs the question" instead of "raises the question"


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## Anne Pottinger (Oct 9, 2011)

loan, lone 
faze, phase 
find, fined 
waive, wave
there, their, they're


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Kay Camden said:


> Apostrophe abuse. It's E V E R Y W H E R E. *cries*


Dave Barry once wrote a column about grammar and punctuation. I will never forget him saying, "The purpose of the apostrophe is to signal the impending arrival of an 's'."


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## The Wyoming Kid (Jun 18, 2017)

"Tortuous" vs "torturous"
Using "loan" in place of "lend" (especially in reference to things, not money)
"Free reign"
"Predominately"
To "rack" one's brain
Confusing "less" with "fewer"
"Pre-existing" conditions


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## Wayne Stinnett (Feb 5, 2014)

Correct: Tom went along with me and Joe.

Not correct: Tom went along with Joe and I.

Rule of thumb; remove the other person from the sentence to find which is correct.
Tom went along with me.
Tom went along with I.


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## C. Gockel (Jan 28, 2014)

I'm dyslexic. The OP's first example "Yay or yae" threw me for a loop. It took me so long to figure it out, I think I'm skipping this thread.


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## GeneDoucette (Oct 14, 2014)

I had a reader take me to task for using 'snuck' instead of 'sneaked'. According to every online resource I've looked at since I received the complaint, either one is acceptable.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

GeneDoucette said:


> I had a reader take me to task for using 'snuck' instead of 'sneaked'. According to every online resource I've looked at since I received the complaint, either one is acceptable.


No, Gene. The only acceptable usage is what I think is correct, whether I'm write or knot.


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## crebel (Jan 15, 2009)

Wayne Stinnett said:


> Correct: Tom went along with me and Joe.
> 
> Not correct: Tom went along with Joe and I.
> 
> ...


I would have told my children your first example is still incorrect because I was always taught "you put yourself last". It also avoids sounding like you are calling your companion mean when saying it aloud and running "me and" together. Maybe that was an etiquette rule instead of a grammar rule?

Correct: Tom went along with Joe and me.


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## AmpersandBookInteriors (Feb 10, 2012)

It's a boxed set. Not a box set. I have enough boxes, I don't need a set.


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

crebel said:


> I would have told my children your first example is still incorrect because I was always taught "you put yourself last". It also avoids sounding like you are calling your companion mean when saying it aloud and running "me and" together. Maybe that was an etiquette rule instead of a grammar rule?
> 
> Correct: Tom went along with Joe and me.


Agree with crebel. That's how I was taught as well.


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## David VanDyke (Jan 3, 2014)

Doglover said:


> I was asked by a new writer on a facebook group to edit her book. She went off in a strop!


I find this mainly happens (happened, as I no longer edit--writing novels pays more) when the author doesn't pay for the edit. Advice tends to be worth what you pay for it.

So, IMO, always charge money, even if it's not as much as it's worth.



Sue Ann C. said:


> I use "awhile" all the time in a context like this: Has he been sleeping awhile?


Depends on what you mean to convey here. You probably know this, but for others:

"Has he been sleeping awhile" means "has he been sleeping for a short time," as "awhile" is an adverb.

"He has been sleeping (for) a while," with the "for" understood (omitted), means "for a period of time," as "a while" is a noun phrase, and tends to imply a longer period of time.

This may help clarify it: "Man, that guy's really been sleeping awhile" makes no sense, as the interjection and intensifier strongly imply a long time, whereas "awhile" means a short time. "Man, that guy's really been sleeping for a while" is correct, and many people drop the "for" in conversation.



My Dog's Servant said:


> Who is hurling them across their handlebars? Or are they simply bad riders who pedaled madly into a tree?


Don't you mean "peddling" into a tree?  Those trees need their knickknacks too, after all. It's not as if they can just go to Wal-Mart whenever they wish.



My Dog's Servant said:


> Just spotted another one: "rack and ruin" when it should be "wrack and ruin"
> 
> Sadly, when I put "wrack" in for definition, Google's definition said it was a variant of "rack" or torture. Nope.
> 
> And then we wonder why so many get it wrong.


Not wrong, just different, according to M-W--though my gut feeling agrees with you.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/rack-vs-wrack



The Wyoming Kid said:


> "Pre-existing" conditions


Nothing wrong with that, if you're using Commonwealth English.

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/pre-exist

American convention is, of course, "preexisting."

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/preexisting



Write.Dream.Repeat. said:


> It's a boxed set. Not a box set. I have enough boxes, I don't need a set.


Either is acceptable. I actually found far more solid references from dictionaries to "box set" than "boxed set."

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/box-set

https://www.thefreedictionary.com/boxed+set

***

Matte vs. "matted" cover.

http://www.bnbindery.com/news-marquee/2016/2/3/matte-vs-gloss-soft-cover-lamination-which-is-right-for-your-book


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## katherinef (Dec 13, 2012)

Write.Dream.Repeat. said:


> It's a boxed set. Not a box set. I have enough boxes, I don't need a set.


I'd rather read books that come in a set of boxes or resemble one than the ones that have been boxed together. Poor things. I can almost feel them being squashed and bruised.  It's not like they come in an actual box, so no need to use the ugly, violent-sounding term since both are acceptable. I think someone said it should be an omnibus, but my books would get lost on a bus, so...  Box sets forever!


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

> Don't you mean "peddling" into a tree?  Those trees need their knickknacks too, after all. It's not as if they can just go to Wal-Mart whenever they wish.


I should be petaling if you're using flowery prose.


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

> Don't you mean "peddling" into a tree?  Those trees need their knickknacks too, after all. It's not as if they can just go to Wal-Mart whenever they wish.


  Actually, tongue in cheek, I'd meant to put "petal", since I see that error every now and then, but I can't even spell write when Im wrong! 



> American convention is, of course, "preexisting."


Hmmm...To me, that seems awfully hard to read.

Personally, I'm with BRKingsolver:


> The only acceptable usage is what I think is correct, whether I'm write or knot.


 Which is why I still prefer grey to gray and theatre to theater, even if I'm not British. Don't ask me why, I just do.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

So fun instead of such fun.
Real good instead of really good. 
Drive safe instead of drive safely (debatable?).

Unfortunately, these seem to have become acceptable.


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

"I feel badly" for you.  Sometimes a good grope just doesn't work.

Actually, that one's becoming more acceptable as an adjective in informal speech, but it still feels wrong to me.


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## crebel (Jan 15, 2009)

My Dog's Servant said:


> "I feel badly" for you. Sometimes a good grope just doesn't work.
> 
> Actually, that one's becoming more acceptable as an adjective in informal speech, but it still feels wrong to me.


That's a good one! I always respond with "I'm so sorry your sense of touch is impaired."


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## Annette_g (Nov 27, 2012)

I've been seeing this one in a lot of fanfics recently _chest of draws_ when it should be chest of drawers!

hale/hail

vale/veil

And I get very annoyed when a book is set in Britain but the characters go to the gas station instead of petrol station, or walk in the sidewalk instead of pavement, walk down the block instead of street etc. It brings me right out of the story.


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## Pandorra (Aug 22, 2017)

Here's one I saw recently. Graveyards are eary, instead of eerie.. Have to admit, that one through me!


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## crebel (Jan 15, 2009)

I have read "hew" several times recently when the proper word is "hue".  One was a newspaper article about the "hew and cry of the crowd".  The other was just read yesterday in a historical romance, "... the crimson hew of her dress ..."  Ugh.


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## anniejocoby (Aug 11, 2013)

How about prison v. jail? I can't tell you how many times I hear people say "The United States has more people in jail than any other country." Uh, no, they have more people in prison, not jail. Jail = the place where you go if you're serving time (less than one year) for a misdemeanor or you are awaiting trial. Prison = the penitentiary  That's where you go when you've committed a felony and you're serving hard time.


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## JumpingShip (Jun 3, 2010)

Paranormal Kitty said:


> One thing I did that I was unaware of is the needed brushed, needed repaired, etc., construction. I had no idea this was incorrect. It sounds fine to me, but should be needs "to be" whatever instead. My brief research told me it's a dialect feature, but I don't have any connection to the region it was attributed to, so who knows.


I think of the southern US or places in Pennsylvania when I see a sentence that says needed brushed or something similar. I grew up near Chicago and still live in the area. Needed brushed sounds odd to me. It's not something I would ever write or say. I would say, needs brushing or needed to be brushed.


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## Dpock (Oct 31, 2016)

"I personally" or "IMHO, I..."

We know it's your opinion. No need to clarify.


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## Rose Andrews (Jun 1, 2017)

Their. There. They're. <---My major pet peeves when an author misuses those. Not saying I'm perfect but good grief, those are basic.


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## Rose Andrews (Jun 1, 2017)

C. Gockel said:


> I'm dyslexic. The OP's first example "Yay or yae" threw me for a loop. It took me so long to figure it out, I think I'm skipping this thread.


My husband is dyslexic and says that sometimes he reads sentences backwards to better understand them.


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## C. Gold (Jun 12, 2017)

A good friend of mine always says he wants to borrow me a copy of his story instead of lend.


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## A.A (Mar 30, 2012)

Doglover said:


> The word is tuition; not intuition.


Ha!!  I read that wayyy too fast, looking for grammar mistakes and not spelling.


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## unkownwriter (Jun 22, 2011)

Debbie Bennett said:


> _Bare with me. _I'd love too - wait - let me get naked ...


Sorry, wrong team. But appreciate the thought! 

Needed whatever isn't a Southern thing that I'm aware of. I do know someone from West Virginia who says it, but that's not the South.

People say "Person and I" when they're trying to sound educated.

Some more for me:

Per say instead of per se.

Sells instead of sales.

My kindle instead of my book.

Weary instead of wary, and vice versa.

Hord instead of horde (or hoard, I've seen both).

He was sat on the stool, instead of he sat on the stool. I went through a period a while back where every single book had that.

Shined instead of shone. Again, a period where every single book I read had this. Either folks had the same editor, or the same cheap ghostwriter.

Lay/laid/lie get me. I'll usually rewrite the sentence so I don't have to say that. And I'm sure I've done fewer instead of less, and loan instead of lend, but again, hopefully not in a book (and lets' not get started on whether I should say "hopefully").

Apostrophe misuse is probably my biggest pet peeve. I see it everywhere. Even my own mother does it. She was once filling out a card (like, after a charity donation, for the store to put on the wall), and she used an apostrophe when writing our last name. I looked at it and blurted out: "Mama, it's plural, not possessive!" An older gentleman behind us gave me an approving look. For knowing the difference, not embarrassing my mother, one hopes.

I admit to being less than perfect, but I do try to write sensibly, and I'm not ashamed to look stuff up if it doesn't "feel" right.

Man, I've been copy/pasting this from page to page, and of course remembered something else. It's not about using wrong words, but punctuation again: When people are typing and leave a space before the punctuation, and often not one after. And I see a lot of people put the money signs after the amount, like 100$, instead of $100. And what's up with the random capitalization?


----------



## [email protected] (Mar 8, 2015)

Puddleduck said:


> "less" when it should be "fewer"
> 
> I see that one SO much. I'm pretty sure 98% of the English speaking population doesn't even realize there's a difference or that the word "fewer" exists.


This is the one that gets me, and I think what really bothers me is that people who are otherwise smart are doing it now, including several smart people on here.

"I received less candy than Mary." <--- Correct

"I received less pieces of candy than Mary." <--- Incorrect

"I received fewer pieces of candy than Mary." <--- Correct

More on-topic for this board:

"My latest Facebook campaign was less successful than prior campaigns." <--- Correct

"I received less likes and shares on my latest Facebook campaign than in prior campaigns." <--- Incorrect

"I received fewer likes and shares on my latest Facebook campaign than in prior campaigns." <--- Correct

The misuse has become so widespread lately that I feel like I'm living through the death of this particular rule.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

> He was sat on the stool, instead of he sat on the stool.


I saw this construction repeatedly in a manuscript I was beta reading. The author told me it's common in England.


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## Paranormal Kitty (Jun 13, 2017)

she-la-ti-da said:


> Needed whatever isn't a Southern thing that I'm aware of. I do know someone from West Virginia who says it, but that's not the South.


I wish I could figure out the deal with it, because I seriously thought my editor was [messing] with me when she kept flagging it. Now I'm conscious about it every time I say it or hear someone say it. And I noticed a sign today that said, "Does your car need detailed?" Lol.

_<edited -- let's choose words that aren't picked just to get around our forum filters, eh?>_


----------



## Annette_g (Nov 27, 2012)

brkingsolver said:


> I saw this construction repeatedly in a manuscript I was beta reading. The author told me it's common in England.


It may be common, but it's annoying. One of my pet peeves - he was sat on the chair rather than sat on the chair. He was sitting on the chair, that one's fine


----------



## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Annette_g said:


> It may be common, but it's annoying. One of my pet peeves - he was sat on the chair rather than sat on the chair. He was sitting on the chair, that one's fine


Is it considered correct?


----------



## Mylius Fox (Jun 2, 2014)

We really need to find a good escape goat to pin all this on...


----------



## The Bass Bagwhan (Mar 9, 2014)

My pet peeve is redundant information.

She nodded her head.

She crossed her arms over her chest.

He stood on the edge of the cliff and looked down below.

He kicked him with his foot.

There's a million of 'em...


----------



## crebel (Jan 15, 2009)

The Bass Bagwhan said:


> My pet peeve is redundant information.
> 
> She nodded her head.
> 
> ...


Yes! The frequent use of "back behind" makes me twitch.


----------



## Colin (Aug 6, 2011)

Mylius Fox said:


> We really need to find a good escape goat to pin all this on...


Blame the nanny state.


----------



## FelissaEly (Jan 15, 2017)

Dragovian said:


> For all intensive purposes.


This is hilarious and reminds me of a scene in one of my husband's books (The Fiasco is all kinds of weird/zany but this makes me laugh every time).



> "Overall, not bad for a first time. But next time, you should correct him. It's 'for all intents and purposes.'" He said each word with a crisp click. It was hard to picture him as a schoolteacher, but Ted pulled off the image well.
> "It isn't 'intensive purposes'?" I asked.
> The interviewee had said "intensive purposes" at least three times. Never mind that Ted wanted me to correct a vagabond who had been waxing on about the best places to sleep at night.
> "No. Don't be ridiculous. 'Intensive purposes' makes no sense. Very powerful reasons didn't match the rest of his drivel. Didn't school teach you anything?" Ted shook his head.


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

That's a whole nother story.

Yeah, about that... _nother_ isn't an actual word. Just say "it's a whole different story."


----------



## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Intense porpoises? I always thought they were rather fun loving.


----------



## Rose Andrews (Jun 1, 2017)

brkingsolver said:


> Intense porpoises? I always thought they were rather fun loving.


They're known to kill their young.

A while and awhile is a weak point for me. Just when I thought I had them down, my editor changed them. I, of course, felt like a total fool. It's a tricky one for me.

Someone up thread mentioned phase and faze. Rawr!! Phase is a cycle. Like a phase in someone's life. Faze is to disturb.


----------



## Philip Gibson (Nov 18, 2013)

On TV, I keep hearing phrases like:

"He is one of the only foreign reporters in Somalia... "

It always jars me, but I'm not sure why.  Is it correct/does it make sense, or not?

Philip


----------



## The Bass Bagwhan (Mar 9, 2014)

brkingsolver said:


> Intense porpoises? I always thought they were rather fun loving.


There's a very popular camping area in Western Australia where you can camp, stay in caravans - and more to the point wade in waist-deep water with the local dolphin population.

The cook at the caravan park, calling everyone that meals are ready, is reputed to announce, "To all in tents and porpoises, dinner is served".

But I haven't heard it myself.


----------



## The Bass Bagwhan (Mar 9, 2014)

Philip Gibson said:


> On TV, I keep hearing phrases like:
> 
> "He is one of the only foreign reporters in Somalia... "
> 
> ...


As against "local reporters", yes. Is that what you're asking? It can be a something of a coup for a foreign reporter to be allowed in certain situations and suggests an objective point of view.


----------



## Linn (Feb 2, 2016)

Kay Camden said:


> Apostrophe abuse. It's E V E R Y W H E R E. *cries*


Beware the zombie apostrophe! 

Bit of a spoiler here - Bruce Wayne and Batman are "one _and_ the same," not "one _in_ the same." Surprising how often I see the latter.


----------



## SerenityEditing (May 3, 2016)

A.A said:


> Ha!!  I read that wayyy too fast, looking for grammar mistakes and not spelling.


I'd venture to say it's still _technically_ correct. I've never experienced someone else's intuition; it's always been my own private intuition.

I use several phrases in speech but not in writing. 
"Whole 'nother story." 
"Heads up" (I gave him a heads-up? a head's-up? a heads up? a heads' up? 
"A hold" in the sense of "I'll get [a hold] of you later," when it's not a circumstance where someone can literally take hold of you. I've seen "get hold," "get a hold," and "get ahold," and arguments for each one, and they all rub me the wrong way in text.

Some words have more than one accepted meaning/spelling - I've seen several in this thread that either have changed or are in the process of changing. For instance, I regularly see people complain about 'nauseous' meaning only 'causing nausea' and not 'feeling nauseated,' but both meanings have been standard for quite some time (see also 'decimate'). I usually advise the 'proper' or more traditional use, but don't fuss if someone declines it.

('Nauseous' in particular interests me - its original meaning (1600s) was an adjective akin to a character trait. If you generally had a weak stomach and could be easily made to gag, you were described as nauseous, even if you were not _at that moment_ feeling sick to your stomach. Within a few decades, though, it was an adjective used to describe something that causes the feeling of nausea - which I guess also makes sense, because I always get a bit queasy when I look at someone else who's clearly about to barf.)

And I can't help but giggle when Muphry's Law strikes, and someone makes the precise error they claim is so simple to avoid. I'm always so happy to see it happen to someone else - at least I'm not the only one!

I'm always trying to simplify phrases like what The Bass Bagwhan mentions. "She crossed one leg over the other." Is there any other way to cross one's legs? "He had a big smile on his face." I tend to let those slide because the phrase seems incomplete with just "He had a big smile," but I always get a flash of the Mr. Motley character from China Mieville's _Perdido Street Station_, with mouths all over his body. "He nodded his head up and down/she shook her head back and forth." And a friend argued earnestly that it's possible to "shoulder someone aside" with, for instance, your knee or elbow.

One of my favorites wasn't in print, but came up during a conversation. Someone said he was going to do something "no bars held." 
It took me a second, and I said, "You mean 'no holds barred'?" 
"No," he said, "no bars held. Like, going all in." 
"Yeah. That's 'no holds barred.'" 
"No, it isn't. That doesn't even make any sense." 
"Can you explain 'no bars held' for me? Because that one doesn't make any sense to me." 
"Well, yeah. Like if you're a prisoner, you know, you're behind bars, and you know how they stand there holding on to the bars?" He mimed someone gripping prison bars at face height. "So, you're limited in what you can do - you can't just do whatever you want, you can only do what they allow you to do. But I'm not holding on to any bars - I'm free to do whatever I want." 
Then I explained the concept of wrestling holds and which ones might be barred/banned in a match, but nope - that was clearly ridiculous and wasn't the phrase he wanted to use at all. 

And the worst part is, the logic was just sound enough that now I can't use the phrase myself without having to think two or three times about which one is right!


----------



## Linn (Feb 2, 2016)

SerenityEditing said:


> Then I explained the concept of wrestling holds and which ones might be barred/banned in a match,


That's good to know. I always thought that saying had something to do with ships and cargo.


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

SerenityEditing said:


> ...
> 
> One of my favorites wasn't in print, but came up during a conversation. Someone said he was going to do something "no bars held."
> It took me a second, and I said, "You mean 'no holds barred'?"
> ...


Yeah, I thought the wrestling link would be obvious. Especially for people in the US, with all the wrestling stuff on TV, and wrestling teams in school, etc.


----------



## SerenityEditing (May 3, 2016)

Jena H said:


> Yeah, I thought the wrestling link would be obvious. Especially for people in the US, with all the wrestling stuff on TV, and wrestling teams in school, etc.


He was a big sports fan, which added to my confusion. This happened pre-internet and I couldn't fact-check it right away, so I worried for a week that maybe I'd had it wrong all those years!


----------



## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Everyone has their pet peeves when it comes to this stuff, and I do put down poorly edited books. But I'm reluctant to make fun of those who make mistakes because *everybody* has blind spots. For instance, I just this year learned that one _stanches_ blood flow rather than _staunches_ it. How many years have I been blithely using the adjective as a verb while inwardly laughing at mistake-makers who knew enough not to make the mistake I was making? Thirty? Thirty-five? It's embarrassing in a pot/kettle kind of way. So, you know ... if you're reading this thread and feeling bad because you've made some of these mistakes, don't worry.


----------



## RN_Wright (Jan 7, 2014)

Back in the Seventies some sales recruitment outfit put out ads that, over a three year period, clearly showed the "progression" of who got promoted and how important the English language was to the management:

Year 1: The turtle relies on its shell for protection. The eagle flies high screaming defiance at the elements. We need eagles!

Year 2: The turtel depends on its shell to protect it. The eagle flies high and screams defience at the elemint! We need eagles!

Year 3:  The turtel depends upon it's shell to give it protection. The eagle flies up high and screams defience at the elefants! We need eagles!


----------



## 88149 (Dec 13, 2015)

"Honey, I shrunk the kids" started an avalanche of wrong tense. It's as if the word "shrank" has shrunk from existence.

Or is it "has shrunken?"


----------



## A J Sika (Apr 22, 2016)

It's 'he sat on his haunches'... not hunches.

The number of times I have seen this mistake


----------



## Klip (Mar 7, 2011)

Content removed due to TOS Change of 2018.


----------



## Yayoi (Apr 26, 2016)

I'm having a hard time using prepositions and punctuation marks. Like, if you write, I'm having a hard time, though. I don't know if there's a comma before 'though' or not. I was actually corrected in some forum and I was embarrassed.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

brkingsolver said:


> I shuttered my house before the storm, but it still shuddered when the wind hit it.
> 
> I've seen so many here that stop me cold when I'm reading. To/too, lose/loose, led/lead, of/have.
> 
> ...


Yes, but a book I recently started reading (note started, not finish) had the people saying 'she shuttered' instead of 'she shuddered' when upset by something.

To all those still going on about my mistake with the WRINGER, do keep up. It has been noted, spoken of, confessed to and every other acknowledgement available. Being a grammar Nazi, I shall probably never live it down!


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

kspen said:


> Using "begs the question" instead of "raises the question"


What's wrong with that? I've never heard anyone say 'which raises the question'.


----------



## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

Doglover said:


> Yes, but a book I recently started reading (note started, not finish) had the people saying 'she shuttered' instead of 'she shuddered' when upset by something.


I believe that 'shuttered' is an acceptable expression suggesting the mind closed down when XXX occurred. e.g. _"As soon as he said the words that chastised her he saw the shutters come down as her mind closed itself to his criticisms." _


----------



## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

Doglover said:


> What's wrong with that? I've never heard anyone say 'which raises the question'.


Again, this is a common expression. _"The case for x, is excellent, but the case for 'y' is as good, if not better. Which raises the question as to whether a compromise could be reached between the two." _


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

anniejocoby said:


> How about prison v. jail? I can't tell you how many times I hear people say "The United States has more people in jail than any other country." Uh, no, they have more people in prison, not jail. Jail = the place where you go if you're serving time (less than one year) for a misdemeanor or you are awaiting trial. Prison = the penitentiary That's where you go when you've committed a felony and you're serving hard time.


But in England a gaol (the original English spelling) is also a prison. They are more or less interchangeable. What about Jailhouse Rock?


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Annette_g said:


> And I get very annoyed when a book is set in Britain but the characters go to the gas station instead of petrol station, or walk in the sidewalk instead of pavement, walk down the block instead of street etc. It brings me right out of the story.


Don't get me started on that! Elizabeth George making a big deal about two main characters driving illegally because they'd left their driving licences at home. We don't need them here.

Peter James (who is English and should know better) in a book set in a Sussex village, calling his car a sedan. We call them saloons. A sedan is a little horse drawn thingy from the 19th century.

Stephen King having an English character in a short story set in England, tell someone something is four blocks away.

I could go on, but it's too early.


----------



## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

Becca Mills said:


> For instance, I just this year learned that one _stanches_ blood flow rather than _staunches_ it.


I just learned something new - thank you


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Philip Gibson said:


> On TV, I keep hearing phrases like:
> 
> "He is one of the only foreign reporters in Somalia... "
> 
> ...


Not really. He is either the only reporter or he is one of the few reporters. He can't be one of the only, unless he's in bits!


----------



## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

Doglover said:


> But in England a gaol (the original English spelling) is also a prison. They are more or less interchangeable. What about Jailhouse Rock?


Yes, and what about all those 'jails' they had in US Westerns. Prisons were for criminals, 'jails' were for drunks, skunks and outlaws.


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Becca Mills said:


> Everyone has their pet peeves when it comes to this stuff, and I do put down poorly edited books. But I'm reluctant to make fun of those who make mistakes because *everybody* has blind spots. For instance, I just this year learned that one _stanches_ blood flow rather than _staunches_ it. How many years have I been blithely using the adjective as a verb while inwardly laughing at mistake-makers who knew enough not to make the mistake I was making? Thirty? Thirty-five? It's embarrassing in a pot/kettle kind of way. So, you know ... if you're reading this thread and feeling bad because you've made some of these mistakes, don't worry.


staunch2
stɔːn(t)ʃ,stɑːn(t)ʃ/Submit
verb
verb: staunch; 3rd person present: staunches; past tense: staunched; past participle: staunched; gerund or present participle: staunching; verb: stanch; 3rd person present: stanches; past tense: stanched; past participle: stanched; gerund or present participle: stanching
stop or restrict (a flow of blood) from a wound.
"he staunched the blood with whatever came to hand"
synonyms:	stem; More
stop the flow of blood from (a wound).
synonyms:	stem; More

Taken from Google's online dictionary.


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

TobiasRoote said:


> I just learned something new - thank you


staunch2
stɔːn(t)ʃ,stɑːn(t)ʃ/Submit
verb
verb: staunch; 3rd person present: staunches; past tense: staunched; past participle: staunched; gerund or present participle: staunching; verb: stanch; 3rd person present: stanches; past tense: stanched; past participle: stanched; gerund or present participle: stanching
stop or restrict (a flow of blood) from a wound.
"he staunched the blood with whatever came to hand"
synonyms:	stem; More
stop the flow of blood from (a wound).
synonyms:	stem; More


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

SerenityEditing said:


> I'd venture to say it's still _technically_ correct. I've never experienced someone else's intuition; it's always been my own private intuition.


It is only correct if you take it out of context, which you have. Private tuition is school or lessons that one pays for. Intuition is instinct. We were talking about schooling, not some odd twist on instinct.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Doglover said:


> But in England a gaol (the original English spelling) is also a prison. They are more or less interchangeable. What about Jailhouse Rock?


I also grew up in England but watched a lot of US TV shows (mostly westerns/Westerns) and only knew the spelling as jail. When the English teacher asked me to read a passage from a book I read gaol as goal as it was the first time I'd encountered it. I was quickly corrected by the laughing teacher, and a few classmates tittered . I still cringe at the memory.


----------



## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

Doglover said:


> staunch2
> stɔːn(t)ʃ,stɑːn(t)ʃ/Submit
> verb
> verb: staunch; 3rd person present: staunches; past tense: staunched; past participle: staunched; gerund or present participle: staunching; verb: stanch; 3rd person present: stanches; past tense: stanched; past participle: stanched; gerund or present participle: stanching
> ...


I agree with this too, but my appreciation was due to the fact I'd never seen 'stanch' used, only 'staunch' and so wasn't aware of the difference/similarity.
Grammatically it appears the 'norm' is 'staunch support', whereas 'stanch the flow' and now that I know I can use both more eloquently.


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

TobiasRoote said:


> I believe that 'shuttered' is an acceptable expression suggesting the mind closed down when XXX occurred. e.g. _"As soon as he said the words that chastised her he saw the shutters come down as her mind closed itself to his criticisms." _


But that's not what was said. What was said was 'she shuttered' - tell how you can make that right.


----------



## lostinspace (Sep 17, 2015)

This thread just goes to show how much writers need editors and proof-readers.  

My bugbear is "bare" vs "bear" (pun intended). But I know it. And every time I use one of them, I obsessively check it in the dictionary. Can you be an obsessive-compulsive writer? 

lostinspace


----------



## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

Doglover said:


> But that's not what was said. What was said was 'she shuttered' - tell how you can make that right.


OK,

_"Every time he censured her, she 'shuttered' the carping voice of criticism and instead thought of what she might do with the knife in her hand,"_

I'm not saying it's a great word to use, but I've seen it around.


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

TobiasRoote said:


> OK,
> 
> _"Every time he censured her, she 'shuttered' the carping voice of criticism and instead thought of what she might do with the knife in her hand,"_
> 
> I'm not saying it's a great word to use, but I've seen it around.


But that wasn't the context. The context was clear that the word should have been shuddered. She saw a huge great hairy spider crawling across her foot and she shuttered? Do me a favour!


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I also grew up in England but watched a lot of US TV shows (mostly westerns/Westerns) and only knew the spelling as jail. When the English teacher asked me to read a passage from a book I read gaol as goal as it was the first time I'd encountered it. I was quickly corrected by the laughing teacher, and a few classmates tittered . I still cringe at the memory.


When I was growing up, in the 50s/early 60s, we still used the word gaol all the time. I really think it was Elvis and Jailhouse Rock that actually brought in the use of the jail spelling, since we had very little in the way of American books that would have had the spelling. It is an Americanism that has penetrated our shores, like alternative.

Oscar Wilde's great poem is called 'The Ballad of Reading Gaol' and Reading Gaol is a prison, not a little jailhouse.

One thing that pees me off is when someone says 'there are other alternatives' - an alternative is a choice of two. Otherwise it should be 'there are other options'.


----------



## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

Doglover said:


> But that wasn't the context. The context was clear that the word should have been shuddered. She saw a huge great hairy spider crawling across her foot and she shuttered? Do me a favour!


You didn't explain that in your earlier post. In the exact context I can see why you think it was wrong.


----------



## Philip Gibson (Nov 18, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I also grew up in England but watched a lot of US TV shows (mostly westerns/Westerns) and only knew the spelling as jail. When the English teacher asked me to read a passage from a book I read gaol as goal as it was the first time I'd encountered it. I was quickly corrected by the laughing teacher, and a few classmates tittered . I still cringe at the memory.


That reminded my of my school friend (who had just read 'The Virgin Soldiers') asking our English teacher what a "wore"was.

On further investigation, we found the word was "whore".

How on earth did it end up spelled like that anyway?

Philip


----------



## SerenityEditing (May 3, 2016)

Doglover said:


> It is only correct if you take it out of context, which you have. Private tuition is school or lessons that one pays for. Intuition is instinct. We were talking about schooling, not some odd twist on instinct.


*whispers* It's a joke.


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

SerenityEditing said:


> *whispers* It's a joke.


Really?


----------



## SerenityEditing (May 3, 2016)

Doglover said:


> Really?


Yes, really.


----------



## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

PaulineMRoss said:


> Please don't let the bride walk up the isle, people.
> 
> As for off of, it's colloquial American, so I don't want to see it in a Regency romance, thank you very much.


That would make for an interesting "trash the dress" session.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

I know it's probably technically correct, but I'm always pulled up by 'after the wedding, the couple went on its honeymoon.'


----------



## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I know it's probably technically correct, but I'm always pulled up by 'after the wedding, the couple went on its honeymoon.'


 I guess it depends on whether you consider 'couple' a thing rather than two people. I would say 'their honeymoon.'


----------



## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

Raelly cna't see waht all teh Fsus is abuot.


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## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

brkingsolver said:


> I guess it depends on whether you consider 'couple' a thing rather than two people. I would say 'their honeymoon.'


Absolutely, a couple in the context is two people will be 'their', a couple of Mint Julip's still wouldn't be 'its' The honeymoon is an 'it' but it's their 'it' so it's their honeymoon, not someone else's.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

brkingsolver said:


> I guess it depends on whether you consider 'couple' a thing rather than two people. I would say 'their honeymoon.'


I've always used 'their', but it was explained to me that couple is a collective.


----------



## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I've always used 'their', but it was explained to me that couple is a collective.


There are loads of grammar examples that fly in the face of the 'technical' definition. Such are the vagaries of the English language and how 'it' is spoke (and written).


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Doglover said:


> Peter James (who is English and should know better) in a book set in a Sussex village, calling his car a sedan. We call them saloons. A sedan is a little horse drawn thingy from the 19th century.


Wait, you mean that in the UK a four-door car is referred to as a saloon?? How did I never hear of that before?? I'm familiar with a lot of British-isms that I've encountered in normal reading, but never run across this.  

Soo, do the British have a word for the place in the American old west where cowpokes go for some whiskey and sarsparilla*, and usually end up in a "no holds barred" brawl??

*In typing this comment, I learned that the word I was looking for is sarsparilla, and not sasparilla, as I'd thought. I don't think I've ever heard the first 'r' pronounced in that word. So I learned something, too.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Jena H said:


> Wait, you mean that in the UK a four-door car is referred to as a saloon?? How did I never hear of that before?? I'm familiar with a lot of British-isms that I've encountered in normal reading, but never run across this.
> 
> Soo, do the British have a word for the place in the American old west where cowpokes go for some whiskey and sarsparilla*, and usually end up in a "no holds barred" brawl??


Just to derail the thread further -
In SA my two-door Honda Prelude is classed as a sedan. My 5 door Hyundai i10 is a hatchback.


----------



## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Just to derail the thread further -
> My 5 door Hyundai i10 is a hatchback.


It's a great car too


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Just to derail the thread further -
> In SA my two-door Honda Prelude is classed as a sedan. My 5 door Hyundai i10 is a hatchback.


Actually, the dictionary I checked said that a sedan can be either a 2-door or a 4-door. I'm more used to them having four doors, though, so that's how I described it.


----------



## Paranormal Kitty (Jun 13, 2017)

Jena H said:


> Actually, the dictionary I checked said that a sedan can be either a 2-door or a 4-door. I'm more used to them having four doors, though, so that's how I described it.


I always thought 2-door was a coupe?


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Paranormal Kitty said:


> I always thought 2-door was a coupe?


It is in the U.S.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Paranormal Kitty said:


> I always thought 2-door was a coupe?


I think that's a 2-seater.


----------



## Paranormal Kitty (Jun 13, 2017)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I think that's a 2-seater.


A two-seater only has room for two. A two door has two doors, but usually seats 4-5. You have to climb over the front seats to get in the back.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Paranormal Kitty said:


> A two-seater only has room for two. A two door has two doors, but usually seats 4-5. You have to climb over the front seats to get in the back.


Yes. My idea of a coupe is a 2-seater and 2-door. But it is probably different in each country. My MG Midget was described on the registration in the UK as body = 'sports'.


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Paranormal Kitty said:


> I always thought 2-door was a coupe?


Sometimes, but not always, as I learned in my 2-minute course on sedan-vs-coupe.


----------



## Sarah Shaw (Feb 14, 2015)

Becca Mills said:


> Everyone has their pet peeves when it comes to this stuff, and I do put down poorly edited books. But I'm reluctant to make fun of those who make mistakes because *everybody* has blind spots. For instance, I just this year learned that one _stanches_ blood flow rather than _staunches_ it. How many years have I been blithely using the adjective as a verb while inwardly laughing at mistake-makers who knew enough not to make the mistake I was making? Thirty? Thirty-five? It's embarrassing in a pot/kettle kind of way. So, you know ... if you're reading this thread and feeling bad because you've made some of these mistakes, don't worry.


No kidding! I remember one time in particular- no, actually, I don't because I've blocked it from my memory- but I can still feel the hot, excruciating, lingering embarrassment! 

Nowadays I tell my younger friends it's just a sign they're well read if they mispronounce words and that they have a good ear if they get the phrase wrong. And before I correct them I try to remember to always look it up first!


----------



## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Sarah Shaw said:


> Nowadays I tell my younger friends it's just a sign they're well read if they mispronounce words and that they have a good ear if they get the phrase wrong. And before I correct them I try to remember to always look it up first!


And now is my chance to ask, how is the word "whinge" pronounced? In the U.S. we "whine".


----------



## Fel Beasley (Apr 1, 2014)

Becca Mills said:


> Everyone has their pet peeves when it comes to this stuff, and I do put down poorly edited books. But I'm reluctant to make fun of those who make mistakes because *everybody* has blind spots. For instance, I just this year learned that one _stanches_ blood flow rather than _staunches_ it. How many years have I been blithely using the adjective as a verb while inwardly laughing at mistake-makers who knew enough not to make the mistake I was making? Thirty? Thirty-five? It's embarrassing in a pot/kettle kind of way. So, you know ... if you're reading this thread and feeling bad because you've made some of these mistakes, don't worry.


TIL it's stanches blood flow not staunches!  I've been wrong all these years...


----------



## Sarah Shaw (Feb 14, 2015)

kspen said:


> Using "begs the question" instead of "raises the question"


I've kind of resigned myself to that one now, since all the journalists started using it. But since I first heard the phrase in Philosophy 101 it still bugs me. 
[For Doglover: In philosophy it's a form of circular reasoning. I never heard it used to mean 'raise the question' until the late '90's. Maybe people were using it colloquially before then, but I never saw it in print. Once you've learned it in the philosophical context it's very grating to hear it used to mean something else entirely.]


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

brkingsolver said:


> And now is my chance to ask, how is the word "whinge" pronounced? In the U.S. we "whine".


I think it's a cross between whine and cringe.


----------



## Sarah Shaw (Feb 14, 2015)

brkingsolver said:


> And now is my chance to ask, how is the word "whinge" pronounced? In the U.S. we "whine".


Short 'i' and 'g' like 'j' is how I've heard my British friends pronounce it. I'm American, so Brits feel free to correct me, but I think whinging is more like 'griping' than 'whining'.


----------



## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Jena H said:
 

> Soo, do the British have a word for the place in the American old west where cowpokes go for some whiskey and sarsparilla*, and usually end up in a "no holds barred" brawl??


That would be the pub, although no sarsparilla is to be found therein. Not many cowpokes, either, but plenty of whiskey/whisky and 'no holds barred' brawls, though.  Also pickled eggs, pork scratchings and darts.


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Sarah Shaw said:


> Short 'i' and 'g' like 'j' is how I've heard my British friends pronounce it. I'm American, so Brits feel free to correct me, but I think whinging is more like 'griping' than 'whining'.


It can be either, really.



PaulineMRoss said:


> That would be the pub, although no sarsparilla is to be found therein. Not many cowpokes, either, but plenty of whiskey/whisky and 'no holds barred' brawls, though.  Also pickled eggs, pork scratchings and darts.


I used to love sarsparilla when I was a child. I haven't had it for years.


----------



## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

PaulineMRoss said:


> That would be the pub, although no sarsparilla is to be found therein. Not many cowpokes, either, but plenty of whiskey/whisky and 'no holds barred' brawls, though.  Also pickled eggs, pork scratchings and darts.


No sarsparilla, but my SO, who is pretty much a teetotaler, did fall in love with the cider in Irish pubs.


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

PaulineMRoss said:


> That would be the pub, although no sarsparilla is to be found therein. Not many cowpokes, either, but plenty of whiskey/whisky and 'no holds barred' brawls, though.  Also pickled eggs, pork scratchings and darts.


Back in the American old west, there was no such thing as a pub... not unless pubs have swinging half-doors.  Every TV western show worth its salt had a saloon. On the classic show Gunsmoke, Miss Kitty owned the Long Branch Saloon, not the Long Branch Pub.


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jena H said:


> Back in the American old west, there was no such thing as a pub... not unless pubs have swinging half-doors.  Every TV western show worth its salt had a saloon. On the classic show Gunsmoke, Miss Kitty owned the Long Branch Saloon, not the Long Branch Pub.


It's an English equivalent, or British if you like. There were no guns, and probably no saloon girls or swing doors, but apart from that they are the same. Pub is short for public house which is the modern equivalent of a tavern.


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Ironically, the online crossword I did today had a clue that was "two-door car."  The answer was "coupe."    


To be honest, I don't hear them referred to as coupes in real life.  There are two-door cars, and four-door cars, and unless they're SUVs or sports cars, they're usually just cars.  The only time I hear someone describe a car as a sedan is on a police show or someplace where vehicles have to fall into definite categories for classification.


----------



## KMel (Sep 17, 2017)

I read a book recently in which the author keept using "broach" to describe a piece of jewelry. I just wanted to scream, "BROOCH!" It was otherwise well-edited, so it was surprising to find that mistake repeatedly.


----------



## Paranormal Kitty (Jun 13, 2017)

KMel said:


> I read a book recently in which the author keept using "broach" to describe a piece of jewelry. I just wanted to scream, "BROOCH!" It was otherwise well-editied, so it was surprising to find that mistake repeatedly.


Well, that's news to me too.


----------



## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

KMel said:


> I read a book recently in which the author keept using "broach" to describe a piece of jewelry. I just wanted to scream, "BROOCH!" It was otherwise well-editied, so it was surprising to find that mistake repeatedly.


This is the problem with using spellcheckers. If it's a word it gets through, if it's the wrong word the author isn't even aware of the error.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Doglover said:


> I used to love sarsparilla when I was a child. I haven't had it for years.


And what about dandelion and burdock? We had that before coca cola arrived.


----------



## DrewMcGunn (Jul 6, 2017)

This is a tenuous connection, but reading lots of books set in the American South, it Dr Pepper, not Dr. Pepper. Unless the book was written in the 1950s or earlier before they dropped the period from the name.

Also, there was a scene in _Love Actually_, where one of the characters uses the phrase, "Just in cases." I can't help but use it when talking even though I know it's incorrect.


----------



## Colin (Aug 6, 2011)

DrewMcGunn said:


> Also, there was a scene in _Love Actually_, where one of the characters uses the phrase, "Just in cases." I can't help but use it when talking even though I know it's incorrect.


Justin Cases? Wasn't he also in Notting Hill?


----------



## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

Bigly?

I want to cry each time...


----------



## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

Colin said:


> Justin Cases? Wasn't he also in Notting Hill?


Fun fact, a lot of Hugh Grants films feature nearly the same cast. Though in the example brought up, it's spoken dialogue and not writing.


----------



## Colin (Aug 6, 2011)

Abalone said:


> Fun fact, a lot of Hugh Grants films feature nearly the same cast. Though in the example brought up, it's spoken dialogue and not writing.


Fun Fact; my partner's ex mother-in-law was once told to f-off by Hugh Grant who was propping up the bar at the golf club where they were both members. Not sure what this adds to the thread, but I enjoyed being told of their brief encounter of the 'hostile kind' by said ex mother-in-law.


----------



## Bodie Dykstra (Jul 21, 2017)

If writing in American English, use "while" and "among," not "whilst" and "amongst."


----------



## skylarker1 (Aug 21, 2016)

My Dog's Servant said:


> The really tricky ones are those you "think" you know, but don't, so you never bother checking.


That's more of a problem for me when it comes to pronunciation. There are too many words I learned only from reading without ever hearing them. For instance, I first thought 'character' was pronounced with the initial 'ch' as in charcoal - and scene with the 'sc' as in 'escape.'


----------



## skylarker1 (Aug 21, 2016)

Sailor Stone said:


> How about, "she waited with baited breath"? Instead of "bated".
> Also, "expresso" instead of "espresso", although it is to the point now that expresso is used so much that it is now becoming acceptable.


'Baited breath' is when the cat eats cheese before lurking beside the mouse hole.


----------



## Colin (Aug 6, 2011)

skylarker1 said:


> 'Baited breath' is when the cat eats cheese before lurking beside the mouse hole.


And dog's breath is when a dog eats anything... or nothing. It's just dog's breath.

;--)


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Colin said:


> And dog's breath is when a dog eats anything... or nothing. It's just dog's breath.
> 
> ;--)


A cat's breath is no picnic, either, cheese or no cheese.


----------



## Vale (Jul 19, 2017)

Annette_g said:


> hale/hail
> vale/veil


We have the city of Vail out here which is in a vale where people often go to get married.

I've seen a lot of people compromising on "begs the question." They know it's wrong because, well, they get corrected a lot. But by saying "it begs for the question" they end up with something that makes sense.

"Plethora" is probably mine. You see it and dearth show up a lot to mean their opposite, especially in magazines like Newsweek. (I used to read a lot of Newsweek for some reason.) I was editing an article where someone said that an artist had released a plethora of CDs. While plethora gets used to mean "a lot" lately, its definition was "too many." So I asked if the writer meant to say that the artist had released "too many CDs." Turns out... he did. He thought all of the albums after the first sucked but had to write the article and didn't think anyone would notice with how often plethora gets misused.


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## Colin (Aug 6, 2011)

Jena H said:


> A cat's breath is no picnic, either, cheese or no cheese.


True. Feed your cat a well matured piece of Stilton and the mice will run away. A nicely ripened chunk of Roquefort will rid your house of rats for many generations.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Doglover said:


> staunch2
> stɔːn(t)ʃ,stɑːn(t)ʃ/Submit
> verb
> verb: staunch; 3rd person present: staunches; past tense: staunched; past participle: staunched; gerund or present participle: staunching; verb: stanch; 3rd person present: stanches; past tense: stanched; past participle: stanched; gerund or present participle: stanching
> ...


Yeah. There's a common perception out there that dictionaries are prescriptive. They're not. They're _descriptive_. As usage changes, the definitions listed in dictionaries change. The mistake I was making is extremely common, so it's reflected in dictionaries. Lots of "wrong" definitions are in the dictionary. But people who are in the know will still titter behind their hands if you seem not to know the "right" way. Over time, the wrong definition may become the only definition anyone knows or remembers, and only a few bitter pedants will remember what the word used to mean. See "nauseous" for an example. The "right" meaning is dying with that one, and at some point it'll be reasonable to see the new meaning as the correct one and the old one as wrong.

Talking about U.S. usage, BTW. Could be that "stanch" isn't used in the UK.

ETA: TLR: Something's being in the dictionary doesn't mean it's _right_; it means it's _used_.


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## Vale (Jul 19, 2017)

Becca Mills said:


> ETA: TLR: Something's being in the dictionary doesn't mean it's _right_; it means it's _used_.


Noah Webster's biography is a good example of this. His choices about words were a mixture of ego and cost-cutting measures, but he always conceded to popular usage. So he may have tried to get us to spell "women" as "wymon," but if popular usage didn't follow he'd change it back to "women" in the next dictionary. And, hey, sometimes he did convince people. Since the UK scientist who discovered aluminum called it aluminum, Webster put it in the dictionary that way even though the UK was changing it to "aluminium" to match "sodium" and other names. Still, when someone talks about silly words being added to the dictionary and "what would Noah Webster think?", the answer is usually "well, he'd add them, because popular usage trumps everything else."


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Vale said:


> Noah Webster's biography is a good example of this. His choices about words were a mixture of ego and cost-cutting measures, but he always conceded to popular usage. So he may have tried to get us to spell "women" as "wymon," but if popular usage didn't follow he'd change it back to "women" in the next dictionary. And, hey, sometimes he did convince people. Since the UK scientist who discovered aluminum called it aluminum, Webster put it in the dictionary that way even though the UK was changing it to "aluminium" to match "sodium" and other names. Still, when someone talks about silly words being added to the dictionary and "what would Noah Webster think?", the answer is usually "well, he'd add them, because popular usage trumps everything else."


Interesting, Vale, thanks for sharing. I'm going to have to read more about Webster one of these days. I actually know only the barest amount about him.


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## Vale (Jul 19, 2017)

Becca Mills said:


> Interesting, Vale, thanks for sharing. I'm going to have to read more about Webster one of these days. I actually know only the barest amount about him.


The Forgotten Founding Father: Noah Webster's Obsession and the Creation of an American Culture by Joshua Kendall was the one I enjoyed most =]


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## rockondon (Aug 2, 2016)

On a writer's facebook group I'm in, they offer all kinds of great advice, such as hundreds of alternatives for using said and asked in dialogue tags, how to use unnecessary dialogue and description to increase your word count, and how it's so much more concise to tell the reader what the character's emotions are instead of wasting time describing their reactions.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Vale said:


> The Forgotten Founding Father: Noah Webster's Obsession and the Creation of an American Culture by Joshua Kendall was the one I enjoyed most =]


Ooo, thanks!


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## The Bass Bagwhan (Mar 9, 2014)

Bodie Dykstra said:


> If writing in American English, use "while" and "among," not "whilst" and "amongst."


I'd call this an interesting discussion between "American vs British" or accepting that some words undergo an eventual modernising without necessarily blaming it on US influence. As the language evolves, we're dropping some of the more awkward practises and I reckon these are two good examples. Even for English author writing I recommend "among" and "while" as modern forms under common usage. "Programme" becomng "Program" is probably another.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

rockondon said:


> how it's so much more concise to tell the reader what the character's emotions are instead of wasting time describing their reactions.


YES!

{Sorry for the one-word post, but I'm just excited to see this said out loud for once - totally agree}


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## The Bass Bagwhan (Mar 9, 2014)

I reckon we could get another ten pages out of the thread if we offer our best, pet-peeve dialogue tags...


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## The Bass Bagwhan (Mar 9, 2014)

PaulineMRoss said:


> YES!
> 
> {Sorry for the one-word post, but I'm just excited to see this said out loud for once - totally agree}


Similar to "his brow furrowed" ( he frowned for God's sake!) or "her lips quirked into a smile" and so on. There's no need to make a Cecil B DeMille production out of simple facial expressions.


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## Paranormal Kitty (Jun 13, 2017)

PaulineMRoss said:


> YES!
> 
> {Sorry for the one-word post, but I'm just excited to see this said out loud for once - totally agree}


I thought that post you replied to was being sarcastic?


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## rockondon (Aug 2, 2016)

PaulineMRoss said:


> YES!
> 
> {Sorry for the one-word post, but I'm just excited to see this said out loud for once - totally agree}


 I hate to say this but my post was about what I consider to be bad advice, and the people on that page constantly give advice that is telling, not showing.

That being said, I do feel that there's a time when a writer should tell, not show, a character's emotions. If it's a fast-paced scene like when the characters are on the run and something is right behind them, I don't want to slow down the pace by explaining the looks on everyone's faces.


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## RN_Wright (Jan 7, 2014)

Words evolve through usage, even through a lifetime. An "enormity" in my earliest memory was a great, terrible thing. Now people use it to mean a really big thing. Something was "of concern" rather than "concerning." "Grimace" was pronounced gri-MAYCE, but everyone on the planet I've been on pronounces it GRI-miss.

Then there's "toward" and "towards." Turns out it depends on which side of the Atlantic you're on.


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## Gone 9/21/18 (Dec 11, 2008)

KMel said:


> I read a book recently in which the author keept using "broach" to describe a piece of jewelry. I just wanted to scream, "BROOCH!" It was otherwise well-edited, so it was surprising to find that mistake repeatedly.


I looked this up once and found that both can be used for a pin. Just looked again to make sure my shaky memory was correct and still found both spellings listed as acceptable:

American Heritage:

broach...
5. Variant of brooch.
brooch also broach--n. A relatively large decorative pin or clasp.

My WordWeb, which evidently uses Oxford says the same.


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## Gone 9/21/18 (Dec 11, 2008)

Becca Mills said:


> Yeah. There's a common perception out there that dictionaries are prescriptive. They're not. They're _descriptive_. As usage changes, the definitions listed in dictionaries change. The mistake I was making is extremely common, so it's reflected in dictionaries. Lots of "wrong" definitions are in the dictionary.


Okay, so if you blow off dictionaries as authorities, what do you use? I was taught back in the Dark Ages that certain dictionaries are the authorities, but perhaps you agree with the people who once told me it didn't matter what a dictionary said, the fact I used "snuck" proved I had received an inferior education.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Vale said:


> Noah Webster's biography is a good example of this. His choices about words were a mixture of ego and cost-cutting measures, but he always conceded to popular usage. So he may have tried to get us to spell "women" as "wymon," but if popular usage didn't follow he'd change it back to "women" in the next dictionary. And, hey, sometimes he did convince people. Since the UK scientist who discovered aluminum called it aluminum, Webster put it in the dictionary that way even though the UK was changing it to "aluminium" to match "sodium" and other names. Still, when someone talks about silly words being added to the dictionary and "what would Noah Webster think?", the answer is usually "well, he'd add them, because popular usage trumps everything else."


This reminds me of the words "gantlet" and "gauntlet", the former used as "running a gantlet." But so many people screwed it up by saying "running a gauntlet," that Websters now says both are correct. However, the use of "gantlet" as a glove is incorrect. It makes me wonder when "I lead the horse to water" will be acceptable. Personally, I always think of animal cruelty when I see that.



rockondon said:


> I hate to say this but my post was about what I consider to be bad advice, and the people on that page constantly give advice that is telling, not showing.
> 
> That being said, I do feel that there's a time when a writer should tell, not show, a character's emotions. If it's a fast-paced scene like when the characters are on the run and something is right behind them, I don't want to slow down the pace by explaining the looks on everyone's faces.


James Scott Bell discusses show vs. tell, and says one should use the best technique for moving the story forward. If you can tell in a paragraph rather than show in two pages, and it doesn't add to getting the reader from point a to point b, then cut to the chase.


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## SerenityEditing (May 3, 2016)

Sorry in advance for the length of this! I got carried away, but everything reminded me of everything else and... 



KMel said:


> I read a book recently in which the author keept using "broach" to describe a piece of jewelry. I just wanted to scream, "BROOCH!" It was otherwise well-edited, so it was surprising to find that mistake repeatedly.


Might be because "brooch" can be pronounced to rhyme with "smooch" or with "poach."



Bodie Dykstra said:


> If writing in American English, use "while" and "among," not "whilst" and "amongst."


Also words like burnt, dreamt, spelt, learnt, and a good score more that are much more common in BrEn than in AmEn. (For past tenses in American English most will be -ed endings. _I burned the toast_; but _throw the burnt toast in the trash_.)



skylarker1 said:


> That's more of a problem for me when it comes to pronunciation. There are too many words I learned only from reading without ever hearing them. For instance, I first thought 'character' was pronounced with the initial 'ch' as in charcoal - and scene with the 'sc' as in 'escape.'


This reminded me of one I saw recently: "If that's what you think, you've got another thing coming." It's one of those phrases that's intentionally ungrammatical (like another one of my favorites: "The hurrier I go, the behinder I get"), and also sort of makes sense in the commonly understood version, but most correctly should be "you've got another _think_ coming."

I read a story not too long ago about a man who approached a campus guard asking to be directed to the Skinky Building. The guard told him there was no building by that name, but the man insisted there was, and that his daughter worked there. The visitor had a strong accent, so the guard started thinking outside the box a bit, but still couldn't come up with any building name that was even close to Skinky. Finally he asked the visitor if he could write the building name down. It was the Science Building: The visitor had taught himself how to speak English from textbooks because he couldn't afford a tutor, so some of his pronunciations were off.

A friend of mine has been a college English professor for 30+ years, and only recently learned - the hard way; in front of a classful of freshmen - that the city in Arizona is pronounced "TOO-sahn" and not "TUCK-son." And I myself have an internet friend who lived in La Jolla, California for about five years before it dawned on me that it's not pronounced like a variant of "jolly old Saint Nick." And I live in a predominantly Spanish-speaking community! You'd think I'd have twigged to that sooner!

And that reminds me of another one - a realization _dawns_ on you, but he _dons_ his best apparel for the party.



Becca Mills said:


> ... The mistake I was making is extremely common, so it's reflected in dictionaries. Lots of "wrong" definitions are in the dictionary.
> ETA: TLR: Something's being in the dictionary doesn't mean it's _right_; it means it's _used_.


"Irregardless" is in most dictionaries now. And I've had a few clients who use it unironically, to the point of putting it back in after I've taken it out. I'll compromise on nauseous and decimate; I'll do linguistic gymnastics to avoid begging the question; but upon the hill of irregardless is where I will make my final stand. 



Vale said:


> The Forgotten Founding Father: Noah Webster's Obsession and the Creation of an American Culture by Joshua Kendall was the one I enjoyed most =]


Another book about dictionaries I enjoyed was _The Professor and the Madman_. http://a.co/3aIzunP (About the OED.) Obsession and murder and dictionary definitions, oh my!



RN_Wright said:


> "Grimace" was pronounced gri-MAYCE, but everyone on the planet I've been on pronounces it GRI-miss.


I had gri-MAYCE beaten into me by my 7th grade English teacher, along with MISS-chuh-vus, to the extent that I tend to mispronounce or over-correct lots of g- and m- words now. (Gallant, glacier, medieval, probably a half dozen others.)

And while I'm here, I know (because I've looked it up) that "doublet" is pronounced like "couplet" but I always want to make it rhyme with "duvet." And I suspect I will die reminding myself that the word is fil-i-gree and not fil-gir-ee.



ellenoc said:


> Okay, so if you blow off dictionaries as authorities, what do you use? I was taught back in the Dark Ages that certain dictionaries are the authorities, but perhaps you agree with the people who once told me it didn't matter what a dictionary said, the fact I used "snuck" proved I had received an inferior education.


I can't speak for Becca, but if I really want to track down the most "correct" use of a word, I research the etymology. But honestly, if 99.9% of people use (eg) "decimate" as a synonym for "devastate," I don't really see the harm in using it that way. Yes, it's nice to know the origin (IMO anyway) and to see how the word has evolved over time, but as long as your intention is clear to the majority I don't see the big deal. I mean, you don't see many people complaining that "nice" doesn't mean "pleasant," it means "precise" - because we all understand. Dictionaries track and record the way people are using words, but we make up new words all the time, and assign new meanings to old words. Eventually one meaning or the other will be considered the authoritative "right" way and one will be "wrong," but lots of words are in flux or ambiguous at any given point.

And I'm sure those people understood exactly what you meant when you said "snuck." I've seen people seize on "stupider" and claim it's not a real word, that anyone with a modicum of intelligence would know the comparative form was "more stupid." Uh...  It's one thing to chuckle about the kind of mistakes we all make, but that kind of spitefulness is just rude - though it's funny when it turns out that they're wrong.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

brkingsolver said:


> This reminds me of the words "gantlet" and "gauntlet", the former used as "running a gantlet." But so many people screwed it up by saying "running a gauntlet," that Websters now says both are correct. However, the use of "gantlet" as a glove is incorrect. It makes me wonder when "I lead the horse to water" will be acceptable. Personally, I always think of animal cruelty when I see that.
> 
> James Scott Bell discusses show vs. tell, and says one should use the best technique for moving the story forward. If you can tell in a paragraph rather than show in two pages, and it doesn't add to getting the reader from point a to point b, then cut to the chase.


I don't know if I've ever in my life seen the word gantlet. To me it's always been "run the gauntlet. As we used to say as kids, "It just shows to go ya...."


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## Scott Reeves (May 27, 2011)

Patty Jansen said:


> And for crying out loud, learn how to use an apostrophe.


I really hope people try and take your advice on this, fortunately, apostrophe's never give me trouble.


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## Valerie A. (Dec 31, 2016)

rockondon said:


> it's so much more concise to tell the reader what the character's emotions are instead of wasting time describing their reactions.


Oh dear... Is this is or is this ain't a violation of the sacred commandment to show vs. tell?


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## lea_owens (Dec 5, 2011)

When I write, I still hear my English teacher from 1971 -76, Miss Biviano, over my shoulder correcting me. She was a quiet and gentle teacher who could look at a paragraph I had written, then glance at me over her glasses and her dissatisfied sigh was more punishment than another teacher's lecture. The word 'nice' was effectively removed from my vocabulary, unless used sarcastically as a one word comment on someone's language or behaviour, although she did say that I could use it to describe a nice cup of tea.

The use of 'who' and 'that' is my pet peeve - it is a person WHO said this or did that, and the object or thing THAT did this or that, but so many use 'that' for both that it has become accepted. Still, I hear Miss Biv reminding me that it is the man who ran, the nose that ran; the child who groaned, the machinery that groaned; the people who laughed, the kookaburra that laughed. 

We learned Australian English based on Oxford English rules, so American English often seems incorrect to me, particularly words like 'color' instead of 'colour', 'Mom' instead of 'Mum', and don't get me started on aluminium (AL-you-MIN-ee-um with the min-ee-um section run together quickly, for those who say uh-LOO-min-um). Goodness knows what Americans make of some of our Strayan drawl.


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## gonedark (May 30, 2013)

Content removed due to TOS Change of 2018. I do not agree to the terms.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jena H said:


> Ironically, the online crossword I did today had a clue that was "two-door car." The answer was "coupe."
> 
> To be honest, I don't hear them referred to as coupes in real life. There are two-door cars, and four-door cars, and unless they're SUVs or sports cars, they're usually just cars. The only time I hear someone describe a car as a sedan is on a police show or someplace where vehicles have to fall into definite categories for classification.


I thought a coupe was a car with a sloping back, which didn't have room for four doors. I've only heard them called coupe in ads for car showrooms though.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

lea_owens said:


> When I write, I still hear my English teacher from 1971 -76, Miss Biviano, over my shoulder correcting me.


Mine was called Mrs Llewelyn. I still hear her loud and clear telling us all about verbs and nouns and vowels and consonants.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

rockondon said:


> I hate to say this but my post was about what I consider to be bad advice, and the people on that page constantly give advice that is telling, not showing.
> 
> That being said, I do feel that there's a time when a writer should tell, not show, a character's emotions. If it's a fast-paced scene like when the characters are on the run and something is right behind them, I don't want to slow down the pace by explaining the looks on everyone's faces.


Exactly. I get sick and tired of books where every little nuance of emotion is described by the character's physical reactions, and more often than not you have to stop to interpret the meaning. Is his heart beating faster because he's excited or terrified? Just tell me, OK? Show don't tell is good advice in general, but there are times and places where telling is a far better option.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

SerenityEditing said:


> upon the hill of irregardless is where I will make my final stand.


And you won't be alone.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

PaulineMRoss said:


> Exactly. I get sick and tired of books where every little nuance of emotion is described by the character's physical reactions, and more often than not you have to stop to interpret the meaning. Is his heart beating faster because he's excited or terrified? Just tell me, OK? Show don't tell is good advice in general, but there are times and places where telling is a far better option.


Thank you, thank you, thank you! I get so sick of this show, don't tell, being rammed down my throat by people who really don't have a clue what it means. I tend to see it as something that should be used when it is useful to use it, not all the time. The problem is, would be authors see this advice and make every line show, don't tell, which not only confuses the reader but reads as contrived.

I think show and tell is a better motto.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

PaulineMRoss said:


> Exactly. I get sick and tired of books where every little nuance of emotion is described by the character's physical reactions, and more often than not you have to stop to interpret the meaning. Is his heart beating faster because he's excited or terrified? Just tell me, OK? Show don't tell is good advice in general, but there are times and places where telling is a far better option.


[rant]
What really gripes me are the "experts" who leave reviews hammering a book for not slavishly adhering to show, don't tell. I also have a problem in my current series with reviewers who took high school biology telling me that my science is incorrect. Excuse me? I have a degree in nursing and a degree in entomology. I might stretch the science a little bit (it is fantasy fiction), but I wish they would keep their ignorance to themselves.

[/rant]


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## Scrapper78 (Jun 11, 2017)

'Show don't tell' kills me.

My stuff averages 104k words. Sometimes I'm just gonna tell the reader stuff so I can get to where I need to be. If it's an important emotional hook? I'll show. Characters interacting in a pivotal action set-piece? Show away. 

If it's the technical minutia of some obscure cybernetic system or the physical dimensions of an object? Yeah, you're just going to get that spelled out for you. Secondary character backstory? Mostly told. Geographic details? Told unless they are important.  Necessary but not particularly dynamic exposition? I consider a challenge to get though that with as few words as possible. Sorry. I ain't got time for that.

I follow the path of Burroughs, Heinlein, and Howard. If nobody is fighting, loving, or dying? Go ahead and tell. (Also, why is nobody fighting, loving, or dying? Are you writing a textbook?) 

My stuff would be 400k if I showed everything, and no one would read it.


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## Guest (Nov 7, 2017)

My motto is "if it's boring to write it's sure as hell going to be boring to read". 

So, write like your pants are on fire and don't worry whether it's show or tell.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Vale said:


> Noah Webster's biography is a good example of this. His choices about words were a mixture of ego and cost-cutting measures, but he always conceded to popular usage. So he may have tried to get us to spell "*women" as "wymon,"* but if popular usage didn't follow he'd change it back to "women" in the next dictionary. And, hey, sometimes he did convince people. Since the UK scientist who discovered aluminum called it aluminum, Webster put it in the dictionary that way even though the UK was changing it to "aluminium" to match "sodium" and other names. Still, when someone talks about silly words being added to the dictionary and "what would Noah Webster think?", the answer is usually "well, he'd add them, because popular usage trumps everything else."


What drives me crazy is when women is pronounced the same as woman. 'The women gathered together ...'.  Women should be pronounced 'wimmin'. I spend the entire month of August (women's month in SA) screaming at the radio and TV - it's WIMMIN.


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## tvnopenope (Sep 14, 2015)

lea_owens said:


> The use of 'who' and 'that' is my pet peeve - it is a person WHO said this or did that, and the object or thing THAT did this or that, but so many use 'that' for both that it has become accepted.


That's my pet peeve too, although nothing bugs me more than seeing "should of" and "could of."


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## Valerie A. (Dec 31, 2016)

"Growing up, my town had only one whorehouse." Now that your town is all grown up, can it afford two?

Don't leave those dang dangling modifiers to dangle. Hang them by the neck until they're good and dead.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

ellenoc said:


> Okay, so if you blow off dictionaries as authorities, what do you use? I was taught back in the Dark Ages that certain dictionaries are the authorities, but perhaps you agree with the people who once told me it didn't matter what a dictionary said, the fact I used "snuck" proved I had received an inferior education.


I don't think you should blow dictionaries off but rather just understand their approach and, therefore, what their strengths and limitations are. The best ones have usage notes on oft-mistaken, offensive, and changing words, as well as UK/U.S. differences. Those are invaluable. This dictionary has a note for staunch/stanch, for instance.

I would not participate in maligning "snuck" users (of which I am one). People who make judgments about intellect/education based on dialect differences are dopes, not to put too fine a point on it.

FWIW, in some regions, the sneaked > snuck shift is advanced enough that "sneaked" is beginning to sound wrong, sort of like dived > dove. Well, maybe it's not quite that cemented, but it's getting there. See ...



















In cases like sneaked/snuck, writers have to decide which side of the language shift they're going to go with. Dictionaries might help them make informed choices, but they generally won't give a straightforward "right or wrong" kind of verdict. Now, if you confuse "lugubrious" with "lubricious," a dictionary can give you a straightforward verdict. That's the kind of problem dictionaries are intended to solve.


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## AugFul (Aug 19, 2016)

> He was sat on the stool, instead of he sat on the stool.


There is nothing wrong with this. The person was already sitting there: He was sat on the stool. If it were: "He sat on the stool" then it would mean he just now sat on the stool. "He was sitting on the stool" could be used as well.



> She crossed her arms over her chest.


Not technically redundant as you can cross your arms behind your back. Maybe someone was getting their hands tied and they crossed their arms behind their back.



> Also words like burnt, dreamt, spelt, learnt, and a good score more that are much more common in BrEn than in AmEn.


I use whichever word is more pleasing to me, regardless of where I'm from. I prefer dreamt over dreamed.



> "If that's what you think, you've got another thing coming." It's one of those phrases that's intentionally ungrammatical
> but most correctly should be "you've got another think coming."


No, it should be "you've got another thing coming" (take it from Judas Priest lol) not "another think" -- meaning, if that's what you think, then you've got something coming (a big life lesson, for example) to straighten you out. Not sure why you think "think" should be there.



> And that reminds me of another one - a realization dawns on you, but he dons his best apparel for the party.


These are completely different things. If something "dawns on you," then you are becoming aware of it like morning light getting brighter and brighter. Someone who "dons his best apparel" is "putting on his best apparel."


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

AugFul said:


> No, it should be "you've got another thing coming" (take it from Judas Priest lol) not "another think" -- meaning, if that's what you think, then you've got something coming (a big life lesson, for example) to straighten you out. Not sure why you think "think" should be there.


We'll agree to disagree on this one. I do think it's "If that's what you think, you've got another *think* coming." For one thing, we've mentioned _think_ once, so it would seem natural to reference 'another _think_,' i.e., another thought or idea or impression.

Plus, if someone says 'you've got another thing coming'... what was the first thing??


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## AugFul (Aug 19, 2016)

> Plus, if someone says 'you've got another thing coming'... what was the first thing??


They are just saying "you've got something else coming". "Another" can also mean different, such as you have a "different thing coming then you think you do."


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

If that's what you think, you've got another think coming.

Both thing and think are used.

https://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2017/04/thing-think.html


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## AugFul (Aug 19, 2016)

Thanks for the link, Monique. I've never heard the expression used with "think." I'm in the US, guess it is not used much here.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

AugFul said:


> Thanks for the link, Monique. I've never heard the expression used with "think." I'm in the US, guess it is not used much here.


Umm,, hello, born in NY state, now live farther south.


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

Didn't read the whole thread, but have we covered commas, semi-colons, em-dashes, en-dashes, and ellipses? Cause y'all gotta get that shit figured out and then, whatever you decide to use, be consistent. Even if you're 'wrong', be consistently wrong. And if you're right, well, thank ya.


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## AugFul (Aug 19, 2016)

> Umm,, hello, born in NY state, now live farther south.


I'm way over here in Oregon. Never heard anyone say "think" in that expression. I apologize for thinking you were wrong.


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## crebel (Jan 15, 2009)

AugFul said:


> I'm way over here in Oregon. Never heard anyone say "think" in that expression. I apologize for thinking you were wrong.


  Midwest here. I've never heard anything but "think", and I have to admit, "thing" makes no sense to me even though both are apparently used!

Another usage I read several times today that makes me bonkers is "good" when it should be "well". Like in response to "How are you?" or "I did good getting such-and-such done today."


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

crebel said:


> Another usage I read several times today that makes me bonkers is "good" when it should be "well". Like in response to "How are you?" or "I did good getting such-and-such done today."


Yeah, in my day-life I'm in a position now in which people always say "Hi, how are you?" My stock answer is "I'm well, thank you, hope you are." Let's face it, when someone says, in passing, "how are you?" the last thing they really want is for you to tell them how you are.


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## Cactus Lady (Jun 4, 2014)

PaulineMRoss said:


> Exactly. I get sick and tired of books where every little nuance of emotion is described by the character's physical reactions, and more often than not you have to stop to interpret the meaning. Is his heart beating faster because he's excited or terrified? Just tell me, OK? Show don't tell is good advice in general, but there are times and places where telling is a far better option.


Yes, yes, yes. And so often, the character ends up looking like they're having convulsions, just because the author didn't want to say "He looked terrfied."

Something else to consider is that a facial expression/physical reaction that says "terrified" to one person might say "excited/outraged/having a heart attack/constipated" to someone else.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jena H said:


> We'll agree to disagree on this one. I do think it's "If that's what you think, you've got another *think* coming." For one thing, we've mentioned _think_ once, so it would seem natural to reference 'another _think_,' i.e., another thought or idea or impression.
> 
> Plus, if someone says 'you've got another thing coming'... what was the first thing??


And you would be right.

He was sat on a chair is something that might be said in dialogue, but it is sloppy and bad English. He was sitting is correct, but one could also say 'he sat waiting...'


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## Guest (Nov 9, 2017)

Doglover said:


> And you would be right.
> 
> He was sitting is correct


'was' is past tense 'sitting' is present tense. 'he 'was sat' (both past tense) on the chair. However, 'I was sitting over there' and 'I was sat over there' both work. It comes down to context and the writer's prose.

******

I really wish people would be more flexible in judging other people's grammar and writing so we didn't constantly have this battle. We have 98% (OK, a slight exaggeration) of the world speaking, writing, English - there are so many different teachings out there that you can only be sure of one thing - everyone interprets words differently, the language is constantly evolving, there are more people speaking/writing a bastardised version of English than there are purists. Just because there are dictionaries out there (for GUIDANCE) it doesn't mean that colloquial versions are wrong. (as in American, Australian, Scotland, Ireland, Canadian, NZ, South Africa, etc.,). If you spent your whole life in one country where words mean one thing, but in another country they mean something else then we 'learn' something if we accept that interpretation as opposed to blocking it and failing to learn anything at all. IMO


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Kyra Halland said:


> Yes, yes, yes. And so often, the character ends up looking like they're having convulsions, just because the author didn't want to say "He looked terrfied."
> 
> Something else to consider is that a facial expression/physical reaction that says "terrified" to one person might say "excited/outraged/having a heart attack/constipated" to someone else.


And if one of your characters is a bird...?  Having few facial expressions to work with, one has to be rather creative with the head and eye movements, squawking, and ruffling of feathers to show emotions.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

How about "he was sat at a table near the kitchen." 

Question: Is this construction okay in some places? To me, it's all wrong.

"I seen him at the door."


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## Paranormal Kitty (Jun 13, 2017)

TobiasRoote said:


> ....speaking/writing a [illegitimate person]ised version of English...


Okay, the filter cracked me up again


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## Gone 9/21/18 (Dec 11, 2008)

Monique said:


> How about "he was sat at a table near the kitchen."


Sounds wrong to me too and gives a vibe of someone else sat him there. In dialog it would be like, "Me and John went to the store," in what it made me think of the speaker. In narrative, it would probably make me decide to read something else unless as is pointed out in another current thread, it occurred far enough in a spectacularly fascinating story for me to ignore it.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Yes, in that example he was sat by someone else. At least, in my head.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

I've heard it said in a colloquial way,  'He was sat there like a museum exhibit'. I thought it was part of a local speech pattern. I doubt I would use it in writing, except for dialogue.


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## Guest (Nov 9, 2017)

He sat by the door waiting for Dorothy.
The seating arrangements had him sitting next to the Curator.
The Queen entered as he was in the act of sitting down.
He sat in the chair because there was no standing room.
The cat sat on the mat.
The sitting room was full of people who were all sat around chatting amiably.
They all sat excitedly at the table concentrating on the spin of the roulette wheel.
The sitting judge was seated in his leather-bound chair. The plaintiff sat on the wooden stool provided, with his attorney sitting in front of him on a leather bench.

Any way you want to play it is fine. You can substitute 'many' of these  with seated/sat/sitting and the sentence would still sound right. 

If it sounds off to you, then don't use it. It doesn't mean it's wrong. We all get used to different usages. It might be worthwhile becoming more comfortable with other ways of saying things. It can only improve your versatility.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Monique said:


> Yes, in that example he was sat by someone else. At least, in my head.


Yeah, I think that's the only way it could possibly work. Even then, I think "was seated" would be the way to go. "The host directed us to our places. I was seated next to my best friend." I don't think I've encountered "was sat." There's the "sat me down" colloquialism. I guess that could generate it: "My mother sat me down and explained the birds and the bees ... I was sat down by my mother, who explained the birds and the bees ..." So, a colloquialism rearranged into passive voice. Sounds awkward to me, though.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Yeah, I was just trying to come up with a possible valid usage.

Now, about that "I seen ..."


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## Guest (Nov 9, 2017)

Well, here you go - the most 'common' paper in the UK, the Daily Mail, provides a pedantic Grammar test for you.

1. Pick the WRONG one:
a. If you could've seen him
b. If you could of seen him
c. If you could have seen him

2. Pick the WRONG one:
a. Please pass the carrots to me and Alice
b. Please pass the carrots to Alice and me
c. Please pass the carrots to Alice and I

3. Pick the RIGHT one:
a. You should have told me you're going to be there
b. You should have told me your going to be there
c. You should have told me your'e going to be there

4. Pick the RIGHT one:
a. The cat had it's legs outstretched
b. The cat had its legs outstretched
c. The cat had its' legs outstretched

5. Pick the WRONG one:
a. The cats' whiskers were all askew
b. The cat's whiskers were all askew
c. The cats whiskers were all askew

6. Pick the RIGHT one:
a. They're there with their grandchildren
b. They're their with there grandchildren
c. Their there with they're grandchildren

7. Which one of these is a simile?
a. The windows were mirrors
b. The windows were next to a mirror
c. The windows were shiny as a mirror

8. Which sentence features a greengrocer's apostrophe (an apostrophe placed incorrectly before the final 's' of a plural noun)?
a. That banana's off
b. I would like some banana's
c. The banana's skins are too green

9. Choose the sentence that includes a gerund verb:
a. The boy disturbed his mother while she read
b. Don't disturb your mother while she reads
c. Reading a book can be difficult with children around

10. Pick the WRONG one:
a. The sky, which was very blue that day, was cloudless
b. The sky, that was very blue that day, was cloudless


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## Valerie A. (Dec 31, 2016)

TobiasRoote said:


> c. Please pass the carrots to Alice and I


This one drives me up the wall every time.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Monique said:


> Yeah, I was just trying to come up with a possible valid usage.
> 
> Now, about that "I seen ..."


That I have heard. I think it's a regionalism.


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## Pamela (Oct 6, 2010)

I haven't read all the pages but what drives me crazy is - Spring, Sprang, Sprung - grammar.

What I see all the time: She sprung out of the chair.  (Sprung is past particle and should be used with had, as in, She had sprung out of the chair - which makes it past tense)  

Correct is: She sprang out of the chair.  

It sounds so easy but I see it done incorrectly all the time in books.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Jeff Tanyard said:


> If I've ever met anyone who actually talked like that, though, then the memory has been lost to the ravages of time.


It is a little "hicky" sounding. I swear, though, authors here have used it. And they don't seem the hicky type.


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## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

Colin said:


> Fun Fact; my partner's ex mother-in-law was once told to f-off by Hugh Grant who was propping up the bar at the golf club where they were both members. Not sure what this adds to the thread, but I enjoyed being told of their brief encounter of the 'hostile kind' by said ex mother-in-law.


This doesn't surprise me. He's stated in the past he hates the paparazzi and just wants people to treat him normally. He's also a private person.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Just because certain words and phrases are common colloquial usage by people with 8th grade educations doesn't mean they are proper English. Just as IRL, if you want people to think you're uneducated, you can use any words or constructions you like. But don't be surprised when the 1-star gang dynamites your ratings. As the OP says, we're authors. Use whatever constructions you want in dialogue, but conform to standard usages in your narrative.


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## Guest (Nov 10, 2017)

brkingsolver said:


> Just because certain words and phrases are common colloquial usage by people with 8th grade educations doesn't mean they are proper English. Just as IRL, if you want people to think you're uneducated, you can use any words or constructions you like. But don't be surprised when the 1-star gang dynamites your ratings. As the OP says, we're authors. Use whatever constructions you want in dialogue, but conform to standard usages in your narrative.


Hmmh! What happened to the English language when it went to the USA?  If all the Brits decided that the Americans can't speak or write the English language and are uneducated because they spell and pronounce words incorrectly [colloquially], then give them 1 star reviews for being illiterate - I'm damned sure they'd invade us and teach us how to speak proper. (then again, I think they already did that).


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

referring to "I seen"...



Becca Mills said:


> That I have heard. I think it's a regionalism.


I hear it a lot around here. It's bad grammar. I also hear "I've went", "Joe and me went" and the like. Just because it's widespread doesn't mean it's not wrong. Some of it's lack of education, some the result of hearing it too often and not hearing it corrected. (ETA: which makes it lack of education.  )

Back to word pairs...read a news article a couple days ago in which a powerhouse lawyer missed averse and adverse. (He was being quoted and it's easy to make a mistake when speaking under pressure that you wouldn't make in writing, so I'm not suggesting he doesn't know the difference. Just a slip of the tongue.)

His firm didn't intend for "averse effects" as a result of their actions. Clearly, he meant "adverse".


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

My Dog's Servant said:


> ) )
> 
> Back to word pairs...read a news article a couple days ago in which a powerhouse lawyer missed averse and adverse. (He was being quoted and it's easy to make a mistake when speaking under pressure that you wouldn't make in writing, so I'm not suggesting he doesn't know the difference. Just a slip of the tongue.)
> 
> His firm didn't intend for "averse effects" as a result of their actions. Clearly, he meant "adverse".


If he was being quoted . . . and the writer was transcribing an oral comment, it's just as likely that the error was in the transcription. Possibly the writer didn't know the difference, or it was just a typo. Spell check wouldn't catch it, after all, as they're both words anyway -- and they're meanings are close enough that I certainly won't condemn a person based on the error.  I dare say I've done worse. 

Here's my thing . . . I don't see much value in getting all bent out of shape about stuff that (a) isn't that big a deal and (b) you can't do much about anyway. For me it just feels like dwelling on the negative which is a waste of energy. AND can come off as a bit 'mean girl' -- essentially making fun of people for how they talk.

I completely agree that you (generic "you" writing and publishing to sell your stuff) should do your best possible work and, if you notice errors, fix 'em. If you're not good at noticing errors, find someone who is. That's true even if all you're writing is a HS essay!

And, yes, there are some local usage patterns that are not 'standard written English'. But, I don't think it's fair to characterize folks who use those phrases or constructions negatively.

Further, I know for a fact, that many people who are very informal in their friendly conversations -- or in message board posts -- are much more formal when speaking with bosses, etc., or when producing something for a better reason than just chat. I knew a guy when I lived in Hawai'i who worked for my husband. He was a fine engineer and, in speaking or writing proposals and what not, his English was near perfect. When he was out on the job site talking to the crew, he used the local pidgin/slang and was one of the best project managers because of it.

Oh, and FWIW, this board is considered casual, conversational, etc. . . . . basically: it's not done to critique people's spelling, grammar, punctuation, etc. based on their posts here. Just sayin'.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Earlier in this thread I bemoaned a remark in a book I'm reading (trad-pubbed by Berkley) in which the author writes "the man fawned over Rowena and I." Well, I finally finished the book, and at the end the first-person narrator makes another booboo: "The agent was all for affecting the disappearance of the culprit" (in other words, making the bad guy go away).

_Affect_ vs. _effect_. I admit it might be tricky in some circumstances, but that doesn't excuse the mistake in a professionally-produced book.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

I just had one pull me out of a book.

"He died his hair."


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## Guy Riessen (Mar 27, 2016)

Alix Adale said:


> Google destroys minds and reap souls:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


But, on the other hand, you might want to watch using "flash" in nearly back to back sentences


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## Guest (Nov 11, 2017)

Jena H said:


> _Affect_ vs. _effect_. I admit it might be tricky in some circumstances, but that doesn't excuse the mistake in a professionally-produced book.


Yes, but that's the problem. Most professionals DON'T KNOW everything 

I read a book written by a 'professional' I found at least three errors in it, but I didn't mind - it showed underneath it all he was still human


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

TobiasRoote said:


> Yes, but that's the problem. Most professionals DON'T KNOW everything
> 
> I read a book written by a 'professional' I found at least three errors in it, but I didn't mind - it showed underneath it all he was still human


In a listing in the tv pages of a national newspaper, I once saw listed Agatha Christie's Murder at the Vickeridge. I suppose the writer took it home and let his five year old do the rest.


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## RN_Wright (Jan 7, 2014)

_Affect_ vs. _effect_. I admit it might be tricky in some circumstances, but that doesn't excuse the mistake in a professionally-produced book.

The complications come from the fact that each of them has two different applications, as a noun and as a verb. _Affect_ the verb and _effect_ the noun are familiar to most people. But _affect_ the noun (usually pronounced with emphasis on the first syllable with a flat "a") refers to emotional response. _Effect_ the verb means to bring about.


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## AugFul (Aug 19, 2016)

Its vs. It's. Easy to mess those up if you write quickly and not paying attention.


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## Richardcrasta (Jul 29, 2010)

I misunderestimated the potential for this topic.
Topis off (Hats off, and wigs off too) to the O.P.


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

Ann in Arlington said:


> If he was being quoted . . . and the writer was transcribing an oral comment, it's just as likely that the error was in the transcription. Possibly the writer didn't know the difference, or it was just a typo. Spell check wouldn't catch it, after all, as they're both words anyway -- and they're meanings are close enough that I certainly won't condemn a person based on the error.  I dare say I've done worse.
> 
> Here's my thing . . . I don't see much value in getting all bent out of shape about stuff that (a) isn't that big a deal and (b) you can't do much about anyway. For me it just feels like dwelling on the negative which is a waste of energy. AND can come off as a bit 'mean girl' -- essentially making fun of people for how they talk.
> 
> ...


Ann...good point on the averse/adverse slip possibly being due to a reporter getting it wrong or even a typo when it was being transcribed.

I don't think anyone's pointing fingers so much as expressing amusement and, occasionally, not a little exasperation at errors. Writers, linguists, and grammarians all go a little crazy over the details because, as Twain said, the difference between the right word and the almost right word is like the difference between lightning and the lightning bug. We like words, and so we pay a lot more attention to them than most. (It's like a musician screaming "It's E flat, you idiot!" while the musically illiterate like me are lucky to catch the tune.)

However, I do disagree with your point (as I understood it) about Hawaiian pidgin and similar situations. Hawaiian pidgin is officially recognized as a separate language, one with its own vocabulary and syntax. It is commonly heard, especially outside Oahu (I lived on the Big Island for 15 years and it's heard a lot there), and many locals and transplants speak it well. In fact, more speak some pidgin than they do Hawaiian, the second official language of the state. It's easier to learn because it developed as a way for immigrant workers of various backgrounds (Portuguese, Chinese--primarily Cantonese, Japanese, and Korean, with English the most important influence) to be able to talk to each other, and for their employers to talk to them. Speaking pidgin to pidgin speakers is like speaking Spanish to Spanish speakers...you're using another language.

That's not the same as native English speakers mangling English grammar. Also, I've noted that English gets mangled at different levels. I've heard well educated people say "between you and I", but I seldom hear them say "I've went".

What IS the same, is that an inability to use English correctly is frequently a serious economic handicap for both groups because it limits the speaker's opportunities for better jobs that require a decent command of proper English. Employment doors for a lot of good jobs can quickly slam shut on otherwise well-qualified job candidates when the HR interviewer hears "I've went" or "I done" or, in Hawaii, too much pidgin and not enough proper English. In your example, chances are good that those workers to whom the supervisor spoke pidgin were never going to have a chance at being supervisors themselves until they could speak English on his level as well as he spoke pidgin on theirs.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Here's one that I'm never sure of - 'how dare you?' Yes, it's a question, but it's also usually an exclamation. So does it have a question mark or an exclamation mark?


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## Colin (Aug 6, 2011)

Doglover said:


> Here's one that I'm never sure of - 'how dare you?' Yes, it's a question, but it's also usually an exclamation. So does it have a question mark or an exclamation mark?


Because it's a rhetorical question, I would tend to use an exclamation mark.


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## Guest (Nov 13, 2017)

Colin said:


> Because it's a rhetorical question, I would tend to use an exclamation mark.


Yep!


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Really? I always use a question mark, then think it don't look right.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Doglover said:


> Here's one that I'm never sure of - 'how dare you?' Yes, it's a question, but it's also usually an exclamation. So does it have a question mark or an exclamation mark?


I think either would be considered correct. Some people do inflect the words to sound like a question. Others simply spit out the words as an exclamation/accusation. So personally, as a reader, I wouldn't blink an eye at either punctuation.

(At least, until Word and other wordprocessing systems make the interrobang common.


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## Guest (Nov 13, 2017)

Doglover said:


> Really? I always use a question mark, then think it don't look right.


I think the trick is to say the word with the expressed emotion.

HOW DARE YOU! Would be an expletive
DON'T YOU DARE! would be a threat.
I DARE YOU! would be a challenge
I WOULDN'T DARE! would be statement

None of these even hint at being a question in any form of the English language.


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## anotherpage (Apr 4, 2012)

I plead the 5th and blame my editor.


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## Linn (Feb 2, 2016)

TobiasRoote said:


> None of these even hint at being a question in any form of the English language.


What about ending a sentence with "shall we." Sometimes it seems like a question, but often it doesn't. I think I've used it both ways at different times, but I've never felt completely comfortable with either.


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## Don Rich (Oct 14, 2017)

I don't know which is more maddening; being corrected by spellcheck when it is right, or when it is wrong!

Just think, when androids take over, the world will become an 'ill literate' place.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Don Rich said:


> I don't know which is more maddening; being corrected by spellcheck when it is right, or when it is wrong!
> 
> Just think, when androids take over, the world will become an 'ill literate' place.


Judging by the number of misplaced apostrophes and bad spelling you see everywhere, I think it already has. I get a little fed up with seeing acommodation, ocassional, and other such things. In Cambridge (the home of the higher intellect) there is a pub that has a big printed sign point around the back. The sign reads restuarant car park.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Doglover said:


> Judging by the number of misplaced apostrophes and bad spelling you see everywhere, I think it already has. I get a little fed up with seeing acommodation, ocassional, and other such things. In Cambridge (the home of the higher intellect) there is a pub that has a big printed sign point around the back. The sign reads restuarant car park.


If I was teaching English I would set the schoolchildren/pupils/learners the task of finding errors in newspapers, magazines etc, or even taking photographs of incorrect signs/posters. I would reward them for each one found. This would encourage reading and correct grammar (if children can still be bribed with rewards  )


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## William Peter Grasso (May 1, 2011)

Hair's breadth, as opposed to hare's breath.
Who _lies_ and what _lays_?
What about _insure_ vs. _ensure_?
WPG


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## Guest (Nov 13, 2017)

William Peter Grasso said:


> What about _insure_ vs. _ensure_?


THAT one comes up a LOT - there's a big chunk of editors out there without a clue about that one.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

TobiasRoote said:


> THAT one comes up a LOT - there's a big chunk of editors out there without a clue about that one.


I always thought the American spelling was insure. Obviously, here in the UK we use the word to denote insurance, to insure a life or a property, but the ensure is the one I mean. Perhaps I've seen it spelled wrong so often, I've come to accept it.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> If I was teaching English I would set the schoolchildren/pupils/learners the task of finding errors in newspapers, magazines etc, or even taking photographs of incorrect signs/posters. I would reward them for each one found. This would encourage reading and correct grammar (if children can still be bribed with rewards  )


When my daughter was about 8 (she is now 45) I read a school project where she had spelled the word 'beautiful' three different ways in the same essay. Not one of them had been corrected and they were all wrong. When I asked the teacher, she said they don't like to correct the children because it damages their confidence. I think it more likely that the teacher didn't know how to spell it.

I used to go through my children's work and correct all the mispellings and make them write the correct version out ten times. If you see something spelled wrong and no correction, it tends to settled itself in your brain and you think it's wright.


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## Guest (Nov 13, 2017)

Doglover said:


> I think it more likely that the teacher didn't know how to spell it.


Hmmmh! I'd give you 10/10 for that


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## Guest (Nov 13, 2017)

As an aside, I use JUTOH for writing and it has a spellchecker with a universal and personal dictionary. I am expressive within the story so I might (for example) write Urghhhh! once, then another time it might be Urghhh, and then maybe Urghhhhhhh!  I have a long list of personal vocabulary now with varying amounts of Oooooh's, Aaaaaaah's and Urghhhhhh's to choose from.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

My Dog's Servant said:


> In fact, more speak some pidgin than they do Hawaiian, the second official language of the state. It's easier to learn because it developed as a way for immigrant workers of various backgrounds (Portuguese, Chinese--primarily Cantonese, Japanese, and Korean, with English the most important influence) to be able to talk to each other, and for their employers to talk to them. Speaking pidgin to pidgin speakers is like speaking Spanish to Spanish speakers...you're using another language.


Linguistically speaking, pidgins are not actual languages. Only when a pidgin mutates into a creole is it recognised by linguists as a true language. But these days both pidgins and dialects (another type of not-a-true-language) are gaining official status. Sorry for the pedantic diversion.


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## Paranormal Kitty (Jun 13, 2017)

I always wonder why no one has ever standardized English spelling to something more phonetic. It's supposed to be the "international language" and yet it's still the only one where spelling can be a competitive sport.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Paranormal Kitty said:


> I always wonder why no one has ever standardized English spelling to something more phonetic. It's supposed to be the "international language" and yet it's still the only one where spelling can be a competitive sport.


That was the bright idea of our education department here 40 years ago, which resulted in nobody correcting bad spelling and my daughter now not having a clue how to spell.


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## Guest (Nov 13, 2017)

Paranormal Kitty said:


> it's still the only one where spelling can be a competitive sport.


That actually explains everything


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Doglover said:


> When my daughter was about 8 (she is now 45) I read a school project where she had spelled the word 'beautiful' three different ways in the same essay. Not one of them had been corrected and they were all wrong. When I asked the teacher, she said they don't like to correct the children because it damages their confidence. I think it more likely that the teacher didn't know how to spell it.
> 
> I used to go through my children's work and correct all the mispellings and make them write the correct version out ten times. If you see something spelled wrong and no correction, it tends to settled itself in your brain and you think it's wright.


I think auto correct also has a lot to answer for. I thought I knew how to spell accommodation, but auto correct had been correcting my misspelling without me being aware of it. It was only when we had a spelling quiz that I realised I had been spelling it incorrectly for many years


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I think auto correct also has a lot to answer for. I thought I knew how to spell accommodation, but auto correct had been correcting my misspelling without me being aware of it. It was only when we had a spelling quiz that I realised I had been spelling it incorrectly for many years


I always turn those things off. Especially those things that want to finish the word for you.

I got an email from a friend yesterday which said she was going to pop into the supermarket on her way to mine. She started off putting Tesco, but I suppose the auto thingy kicked in and what I got was testosterone!

I can understand people not being able to spell, especially if they're not great readers, but what they find so difficult about apostrophes I'll never understand.


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## Guest (Nov 13, 2017)

Doglover said:


> I can understand people not being able to spell, especially if they're not great readers, but what they find so difficult about apostrophes I'll never understand.


If they're not great spellers, or avid readers they probably have more important and pressing issues in their lives than where to place an apostrophe.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

TobiasRoote said:


> If they're not great spellers, or avid readers they probably have more important and pressing issues in their lives than where to place an apostrophe.


Then they should be allowed near the internet or any sort of signage.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

I think it is often people who don't read who are the worst at spelling. Sometimes I spell a word incorrectly, but recognise instantly that it 'doesn't look right' because I've seen it spelled correctly so many times. 
I know someone who is wealthy enough to own his own yot.
But can you guess what word this writer meant when she spelled it 'kubbert'?


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## Don Rich (Oct 14, 2017)

Language, for lack of a better term, 'evolves' under each generation's own terms. I'm not saying that this is correct, but look how far we've drifted from the days of The Bard: "Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio, a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy." While I'm not a fan of ye olde English, I still shudder to think of how this line would be written today. Olde versus old, would 'old' have been considered wrong back then? If so, how did it become acceptable? Perhaps when enough people started changing it? How and why did we in the the Colonies decide that 'harbour' should be replaced by 'harbor'?

There is, of course, a much larger issue that we are all skirting, the eight hundred pound gorilla in the room. I know, I know, it makes us all uncomfortable as can be, and it is a great cause of unrest, but I have to throw it out there. Is it proper or at least acceptable to start a sentence with 'and' or 'but'?


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## Angela Holder (Mar 19, 2014)

The one that baffles me is when "ancestors" is used to mean "descendants."  The words are completely different and their meanings are opposite, so I'm not sure how anybody can confuse them.  And I don't think I've ever seen it the other way around.  Is there a region or dialect where "ancestors" is commonly used to mean children, grandchildren, etc.?


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## Guest (Nov 13, 2017)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I know someone who is wealthy enough to own his own yot.


Sorry, did you mean Yacht? (I did have to check my spelling on this one as I always want to put a 'u' in it).


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## Guest (Nov 13, 2017)

Doglover said:


> Then they should be allowed near the internet or any sort of signage.


What? Shouldn't there be a 'not' in there somewhere?


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## Gone 9/21/18 (Dec 11, 2008)

I wonder if poor hearing, or at least inaccurate spoken language, enters into some of this? Assuming kubbert is cupboard, someone is hearing that last consonant as a t instead of a d. A lot of phonetic spellings seem to have the same close but not quite on target interpretation.


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## RN_Wright (Jan 7, 2014)

Then there's attribution problems. Years ago I was looking at my sister's Beta Club magazine. The young scholar writing the opening article appealed to the dictionary for the definition of a word. She began "Daniel Webster defines . . . ." 

Maybe he did or didn't but I'm quite sure Noah did.


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

PaulineMRoss said:


> Linguistically speaking, pidgins are not actual languages. Only when a pidgin mutates into a creole is it recognised by linguists as a true language. But these days both pidgins and dialects (another type of not-a-true-language) are gaining official status. Sorry for the pedantic diversion.


True. But Hawaiian pidgin is officially considered a creole language. Maybe it wasn't accepted in the past but now it's crept over the new divide? At any rate, according to a professor of English and a professor of Hawaiian at the University of Hawaii I knew, it's listed as a creole language.


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

Kubbert. Cupboard. I was recently lamenting that the Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang may never be finished (volumn H-O looks so forlorn with A-G but no R-Z beside it). I checked and evidently the funding that supported the effort dried up with no new dollars in sight.

Anyhoo....A number of years ago Smithsonian Magazine had an article about the project. In it, I remember, they said one of the most intractable phrases had been "fade barn" as reported by one researcher in one of the Southern states. They couldn't find a reference to it anywhere and were growing desperate until one day another researcher was out in the field and asked an old farmer if he'd ever heard of it. Farmer's answer? (In heavily accented Southern) " 'Course I have! A fade barn is whar you keep the fade fer the cows!"

[For the Queen's subjects among us, that translates to "feed" in Midwestern English.   )


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

My Dog's Servant said:


> Anyhoo....A number of years ago Smithsonian Magazine had an article about the project. In it, I remember, they said one of the most intractable phrases had been "fade barn" as reported by one researcher in one of the Southern states. They couldn't find a reference to it anywhere and were growing desperate until one day another researcher was out in the field and asked an old farmer if he'd ever heard of it. Farmer's answer? (In heavily accented Southern) " 'Course I have! A fade barn is whar you keep the fade fer the cows!"
> 
> [For the Queen's subjects among us, that translates to "feed" in Midwestern English.  )


This story reminds me of a similar story set in the south. An outdoor nativity scene was set up in anticipation of the Christmas holiday, but for some reason the Wise Men were wearing firefighter helmets. A visitor to the town couldn't figure out why that was, but nobody else (none of the southerners/locals) seemed to think twice about it. Finally, the visitor asked why the men were wearing firefighter helmets. They looked at him askance and said, "You furriners ask the silliest questions. Everyone knows what the bible says: The wise men came from afar."
(Afar = a fire.)


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

Jena H said:


> This story reminds me of a similar story set in the south. An outdoor nativity scene was set up in anticipation of the Christmas holiday, but for some reason the Wise Men were wearing firefighter helmets. A visitor to the town couldn't figure out why that was, but nobody else (none of the southerners/locals) seemed to think twice about it. Finally, the visitor asked why the men were wearing firefighter helmets. They looked at him askance and said, "You furriners ask the silliest questions. Everyone knows what the bible says: The wise men came from afar."
> (Afar = a fire.)


I was munching on a cookie when I read this. Now I have to clean a ton of crumbs off my keyboard!


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

Not grammar/language, but...  For this month's elections, a neighbor was in line to vote behind a young man who was voting for the first time. He evidently printed his name. The poll worker corrected him, saying he was supposed to use his signature. His response? His printed name WAS his signature. He didn't know how to write it any other way--they'd never learned cursive in school.

I thought that had to be a tall tale, but several parents I've talked to here confirmed that the local schools aren't teaching cursive so they've had to "home school" their children in the art of longhand writing.


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## Gone 9/21/18 (Dec 11, 2008)

My Dog's Servant said:


> I thought that had to be a tall tale, but several parents I've talked to here confirmed that the local schools aren't teaching cursive so they've had to "home school" their children in the art of longhand writing.


A while back I had a cop tell me the kids they haul in these days can't even sign their names on forms.


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## Vale (Jul 19, 2017)

My Dog's Servant said:


> I thought that had to be a tall tale, but several parents I've talked to here confirmed that the local schools aren't teaching cursive so they've had to "home school" their children in the art of longhand writing.


I was just reading an article on cursive and penmanship this morning: http://www.artofmanliness.com/2014/12/16/improve-your-cursive-handwriting/


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## hjordisa (Sep 4, 2017)

Most of these things don't bother me, because I value clarity more than proper English, and I've been exposed to a lot of regional variants, so those in particular sound fine to me, even when they're outside my usage. But "Yay" for yea drives me batty every time. Not that I'd correct it unless they'd asked me to.


SerenityEditing said:


> "She crossed one leg over the other." Is there any other way to cross one's legs?


Sort of? That brings to mind one leg being entirely over the other rather than crossing them so that each leg is over the opposite foot.


Vale said:


> We have the city of Vail out here which is in a vale where people often go to get married.


City? Unless you're thinking of a different vale of Vail than I am it's most definitely Town of Vail. 


Becca Mills said:


> Yeah. There's a common perception out there that dictionaries are prescriptive. They're not. They're _descriptive_. As usage changes, the definitions listed in dictionaries change. The mistake I was making is extremely common, so it's reflected in dictionaries. Lots of "wrong" definitions are in the dictionary.


They're more prescriptive than they let on. They (or at least M-W) vet usage primarily through publications and/or acceptability in style guides, so it has to be professionally accepted as "not a mistake" to some extent. Informal use and inclusion in slang or informal dictionaries isn't (usually? IK there's a slang/informal tag) enough, even if it's a perfectly logical variant that once was acceptable. 
[I may have written to them. I didn't really expect the word to be included, but I don't see how they can claim to be entirely descriptive if a major criterion is usage in official publications that have been edited. I dunno. Maybe it's perception. Staunch (in the "wrong" sense) is pretty far gone. People who use this word are still considered uneducated. I'd use it in protest if I wouldn't be as well. I might anyway, someday.]


My Dog's Servant said:


> Also, I've noted that English gets mangled at different levels. I've heard well educated people say "between you and I",


A bit of a digression, but this and other cases where the sentence doesn't work in the singular is why I'll usually recommend people replace with either we or us (then use I or me respectively) rather than remove the other party. It requires them to remember (or work out, by testing a different sentence) which is equivalent to which, but it's more universally useful.


Doglover said:


> I can understand people not being able to spell, especially if they're not great readers, but what they find so difficult about apostrophes I'll never understand.


I actually understand its/it's. Usually possessives are noun + apostrophe s. The other possessive pronouns don't use apostrophes, sure, but none of them are the nominative pronoun followed by 's' either. And I'll find such typos in my own writing on occasion.
But some misuse of apostrophes. Yeah. No idea.


Don Rich said:


> There is, of course, a much larger issue that we are all skirting, the eight hundred pound gorilla in the room. I know, I know, it makes us all uncomfortable as can be, and it is a great cause of unrest, but I have to throw it out there. Is it proper or at least acceptable to start a sentence with 'and' or 'but'?


Had a teacher who would say we can break the rules as long as we did it well. He had us studying from Strunk and White, which I'm pretty sure included this rule. I agonized over a sentence starting with 'and' (I think it was) in one of my essays. Normally I wouldn't care, but would he? I kept it in anyway. It just flowed better. I was quite pleased when I got that paper back and he'd written "great sentence!" next to it.
So yes, yes it is proper. So says Random English Teacher I Didn't Even Like.

I'll admit, there are a few cursive letters, especially capitals, but some uncommon lower case, that I can never remember and/or have trouble producing. Don't ask me to write Spanish in cursive on your cake. Too many 'zs.' (I also have trouble with 'n' and 'm.' I know them, but I can't produce them in a way that doesn't look weird.)


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## Valerie A. (Dec 31, 2016)

My Dog's Servant said:


> [For the Queen's subjects among us, that translates to "feed" in Midwestern English.  )


Yea, it all depends on your giraffical position.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

TobiasRoote said:


> What? Shouldn't there be a 'not' in there somewhere?


So what did you do with my 'not'? It was there when I posted it, I know it was, so own up, Tobias; what did you do with it?


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## Guest (Nov 14, 2017)

Doglover said:


> So what did you do with my 'not'? It was there when I posted it, I know it was, so own up, Tobias; what did you do with it?


Ha!


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## Kathy Dee (Aug 27, 2016)

Lydniz said:


> Please stop getting "off of" things.


There should be a campaign about this ^ but anyway, I'll add one: it's a _mine _of useful information; not a mind!


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

ellenoc said:


> A while back I had a cop tell me the kids they haul in these days can't even sign their names on forms.


I can think of a dozen flippant replies to this...just because the brain is having a hard time grasping all the implications, none of them good.



Vale said:


> I was just reading an article on cursive and penmanship this morning: http://www.artofmanliness.com/2014/12/16/improve-your-cursive-handwriting/


Interesting! Thanks for sharing.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

TobiasRoote said:


> If they're not great spellers, or avid readers they probably have more important and pressing issues in their lives than where to place an apostrophe.


There is nothing in the world more important than where to place an apostrophe. End of story. Ask the lady who stood in front of the signage for the premiere of 'Two Weeks Notice' (sic) holding up an apostrophe on a stick.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Jena H said:


> This story reminds me of a similar story set in the south. An outdoor nativity scene was set up in anticipation of the Christmas holiday, but for some reason the Wise Men were wearing firefighter helmets. A visitor to the town couldn't figure out why that was, but nobody else (none of the southerners/locals) seemed to think twice about it. Finally, the visitor asked why the men were wearing firefighter helmets. They looked at him askance and said, "You furriners ask the silliest questions. Everyone knows what the bible says: The wise men came from afar."
> (Afar = a fire.)


A friend of mine grew up in the mountains in North Carolina and spent her entire university career trying to purge her "hillbilly" accent. On a forum similar to this, she told the story of an English teacher who tutored her in proper diction. Someone said they had never heard such an accent. My friend said, "think of a cockney on Quaaludes."


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

brkingsolver said:


> A friend of mine grew up in the mountains in North Carolina and spent her entire university career trying to purge her "hillbilly" accent. On a forum similar to this, she told the story of an English teacher who tutored her in proper diction. Someone said they had never heard such an accent. My friend said, "think of a cockney on Quaaludes."


I moved to NC when I was in my 20s. I've been told I might have picked up a very slight twang at times,but for the most part I still speak as I did before. And I think my son also has very little, if any, 'twang.' But getting to your point, I know of one famous news reporter/anchor who worked diligently to rid himself of any accent at all.


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## Jerry S. (Mar 31, 2014)

"Dominant" not "Dominate" ("The team was dominant")

Using "leverage" as a verb

"for Free" (its either "Free" or "for nothing", it cannot be "for free")

"For all _intensive_ purposes"

Core vs Corps

...

There are others but those have ticked me off lately


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Lynna said:


> Communication is what language is all about. No one is going to see any of those words you mentioned and not understand what the person who wrote it meant.
> 
> So when I see things like that, I smile and get on with life. I probably have a load of mistakes to make today that I haven't yet made. Wouldn't want to be a slacker.  (Or maybe I would, but it really doesn't pay well.)
> 
> And kubbert? I'd say cupboard. Am I right?  I'd really like to know.


Correct - it was supposed to be cupboard


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

TobiasRoote said:


> Sorry, did you mean Yacht? (I did have to check my spelling on this one as I always want to put a 'u' in it).


That was how the owner spelled it . I've always made sure to spell it correctly (yacht) if I need to use it in a reply


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Jena H said:


> This story reminds me of a similar story set in the south. An outdoor nativity scene was set up in anticipation of the Christmas holiday, but for some reason the Wise Men were wearing firefighter helmets. A visitor to the town couldn't figure out why that was, but nobody else (none of the southerners/locals) seemed to think twice about it. Finally, the visitor asked why the men were wearing firefighter helmets. They looked at him askance and said, "You furriners ask the silliest questions. Everyone knows what the bible says: The wise men came from afar."
> (Afar = a fire.)


That reminds me of a story in Deric Londen's biography about this mother. When Deric was small his school was doing some sort of play and the children had to be dressed up. The teacher explained to his mother what was required and she duly went out and bought a roll of bright green crepe paper. Deric dutifully went to school the following week wrapped in decorative layers of the crepe paper, accompanied by his proud mother. 
One arrival at the school the teacher looked rather askance. After questioning his mother she said, "No, Mrs Longden, Deric was supposed to be dressed as a SPRITE not a SPROUT.


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## Paranormal Kitty (Jun 13, 2017)

Jena H said:


> I moved to NC when I was in my 20s. I've been told I might have picked up a very slight twang at times,but for the most part I still speak as I did before. And I think my son also has very little, if any, 'twang.' But getting to your point, I know of one famous news reporter/anchor who worked diligently to rid himself of any accent at all.


Do you think the southern accent is dying out where you are? I know in the Ozarks around Fayetteville, AR, it seems like a lot of older people have accents but hardly any younger people do.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Paranormal Kitty said:


> Do you think the southern accent is dying out where you are? I know in the Ozarks around Fayetteville, AR, it seems like a lot of older people have accents but hardly any younger people do.


Where I live now there are a lot of transplants from elsewhere, so it might be difficult to find a "native" who was born here... at least, over the age of 40 or so.

I think the preponderance of electronic media and young people being exposed to videos or entertainment from all over the world might eventually affect the way people speak. That can apply to both accents and word usage. Plus, it's easier for young people to travel these days, as they can connect with people online so they feel like they "know" someone to visit or stay with. After all, on this board we all "know" people from all over the world.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> That reminds me of a story in Deric Londen's biography about this mother. When Deric was small his school was doing some sort of play and the children had to be dressed up. The teacher explained to his mother what was required and she duly went out and bought a roll of bright green crepe paper. Deric dutifully went to school the following week wrapped in decorative layers of the crepe paper, accompanied by his proud mother.
> One arrival at the school the teacher looked rather askance. After questioning his mother she said, "No, Mrs Longden, Deric was supposed to be dressed as a SPRITE not a SPROUT.


We spent four days in Paris back in the nineties, my husband, me and our fifteen year old daughter. While we were in Notre Dame Cathedral, she was looking at a statue of Joan of Arc and reading the notices beside it, one of which was in English. Then she wanted to know how she had times to get all those animals together if she was only fifteen!


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Jena H said:


> I think the preponderance of electronic media and young people being exposed to videos or entertainment from all over the world might eventually affect the way people speak. That can apply to both accents and word usage. Plus, it's easier for young people to travel these days, as they can connect with people online so they feel like they "know" someone to visit or stay with. After all, on this board we all "know" people from all over the world.


I would agree with this, but I also think there's a difference between city and country. My friend grew up about 40 miles northwest of Boone. I also remember trying to order breakfast in a Waffle House in Helena, Georgia. The only way I could communicate with the young lady waiting on me was to point at the menu. We did not share a spoken language. At the time I had been living in the South for over a year.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

brkingsolver said:


> I would agree with this, but I also think there's a difference between city and country. My friend grew up about 40 miles northwest of Boone. I also remember trying to order breakfast in a Waffle House in Helena, Georgia. The only way I could communicate with the young lady waiting on me was to point at the menu. We did not share a spoken language. At the time I had been living in the South for over a year.


The first time I met my father-in-law-to-be (now an ex father-in-law) we were at a restaurant and he looked at me and said something. Not understanding, I asked him to repeat it. I still didn't get it. My then-boyfriend had to translate: "He asked if you want something to eat."

Interestingly, even people in the south have different "southern" accents. Someone from rural NC might not understand someone in small-town Georgia, or Mississippi, or whatever. It's a strange world.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

hjordisa said:


> They're more prescriptive than they let on. They (or at least M-W) vet usage primarily through publications and/or acceptability in style guides, so it has to be professionally accepted as "not a mistake" to some extent. Informal use and inclusion in slang or informal dictionaries isn't (usually? IK there's a slang/informal tag) enough, even if it's a perfectly logical variant that once was acceptable.


This is an important point. The dictionaries' claims about adopting linguistic relativism are more public relations than reality--they're pandering to antinomianism. They could not literally replace learned usage with everyday usage without including every variant ever printed or spoken. They haven't done that, of course, not only because it would be impossible, but because it would bring into question dictionaries' very _raison d'etre_. All they've done is include a few informal words and usages, along with press releases preening about how hip they are.


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## hjordisa (Sep 4, 2017)

WHDean said:


> This is an important point. The dictionaries' claims about adopting linguistic relativism are more public relations than reality--they're pandering to antinomianism. They could not literally replace learned usage with everyday usage without including every variant ever printed or spoken. They haven't done that, of course, not only because it would be impossible, but because it would bring into question dictionaries' very _raison d'etre_. All they've done is include a few informal words and usages, along with press releases preening about how hip they are.


Although, I do note that Oxford lists 'commenter' in its online dictionary, while M-W doesn't. 'Commenter' is largely an internet usage (though the start of its rise predates the internet and certainly any mass use thereof), the more traditionally acceptable form being, of course, 'commentator.'
Google ngram actually puts it roughly on par in use with my proposed addition these days, and below it in the past, but the correct form of my proposed addition is far more common than even 'commentator,' so I'm sure that's a factor and Oxford won't be listening to my letter either. (As I said, it's still largely considered incorrect, so I didn't really expect anything. I'm just weirdly passionate about it, so I gave it a shot.)
At any rate, the inclusion of 'commenter' in Oxford but not M-W suggests that perhaps Oxford is less prescriptive. But as you point out, of course they would be more prescriptive than not. 
Even if they can't include everything ever (wiktionary, being crowd-sourced and in effect unlimited in space, can come close and in fact includes my proposed addition with a note that it's often considered incorrect but without judgement) they could include more of the common informal forms that don't often make it into books/articles/studies/etc. than they do. But ultimately they are a resource that people turn to for advice on spelling and acceptable usage, so by nature they're prescriptive, even if they take popular usage into account. Which I think is what you were getting at.

Err, to steer a bit of on topic discussion: is anybody here bothered by the internet use of commenter rather than commentator? My spell check flags it. Must use M-W.  In my mind there's a distinction where a commenter could be any old person, but a commentator comments professionally, such as a sports commentator. I'd probably even take that offline. Some guy in a bar yelling at the TV might be a sports commenter.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

hjordisa, I guess I don't think of dictionaries' focus on published sources as prescriptivist, exactly, but more as an effort not to waste time on ephemera. If a word sticks around for a bit, it'll make it in, but why devote resources to every flash in the slang pan?


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

Since this thread rambles a bit (mea culpa!), I thought I'd go ahead and share this, anyway...

Overheard today...

Secretary to elderly gentleman: How are you today?

Elderly gentleman: Finer than a frog's hair!

Secretary: Er...yes?

Elderly gentleman:  Have you ever seen a hairy frog? Of course not! That's because their hair's so fine. And I'm even finer than that!


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

Jena H said:


> This story reminds me of a similar story set in the south. An outdoor nativity scene was set up in anticipation of the Christmas holiday, but for some reason the Wise Men were wearing firefighter helmets. A visitor to the town couldn't figure out why that was, but nobody else (none of the southerners/locals) seemed to think twice about it. Finally, the visitor asked why the men were wearing firefighter helmets. They looked at him askance and said, "You furriners ask the silliest questions. Everyone knows what the bible says: The wise men came from afar."
> (Afar = a fire.)


I love that one!

Here's a similar story: A Northern woman moved to the South and bought a rental property. When she advertised it, a young woman called and asked "Do you accept payettes?"

The puzzled landlord couldn't figure this out. Was the woman asking if she accepted rent vouchers? She kept asking the woman to repeat the question. Finally the caller said, "Payettes! You know, dogs and cats!"

[Payettes: You drawl when you say "pets."]


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Bluebonnet said:


> I love that one!
> 
> Here's a similar story: A Northern woman moved to the South and bought a rental property. When she advertised it, a young woman called and asked "Do you accept payettes?"
> 
> ...


Haha, been there, heard that. Don't get me started! I've noticed that here in the south, one-syllable words end up sounding like two-syllable words. Pay-ette = pet. Bay-ed = bed, etc.


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## The Bass Bagwhan (Mar 9, 2014)

I have a question... really. In Oz we're rarely against the idea of having "a couple of beers". But a lot of US writers will only drink "a couple beers". They drop the "of".

Is this a colloquialism or regional dialect thing? Is it common?


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

The Bass Bagwhan said:


> I have a question... really. In Oz we're rarely against the idea of having "a couple of beers". But a lot of US writers will only drink "a couple beers". They drop the "of".
> 
> Is this a colloquialism or regional dialect thing? Is it common?


It may be a regionalism. I would say "couple of".


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

The Bass Bagwhan said:


> I have a question... really. In Oz we're rarely against the idea of having "a couple of beers". But a lot of US writers will only drink "a couple beers". They drop the "of".
> 
> Is this a colloquialism or regional dialect thing? Is it common?


I think it's a personal choice. As the cliche' says, I've heard it both ways.

Also, it just may be a matter of people speaking quickly, and the "of" gets squished between words ("couple-a beers"), sometimes to the point of being indistinguishable, so people don't hear it ("couple beers"). If they don't hear it, they don't know it's there, they don't write it. Same goes for "couple of drinks / couple drinks."


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## Mylius Fox (Jun 2, 2014)

Jerry S. said:


> Using "leverage" as a verb


Leverage is one of the greatest verbs of all time, IMHO.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

hjordisa said:


> Although, I do note that Oxford lists 'commenter' in its online dictionary, while M-W doesn't. 'Commenter' is largely an internet usage (though the start of its rise predates the internet and certainly any mass use thereof), the more traditionally acceptable form being, of course, 'commentator.'
> Google ngram actually puts it roughly on par in use with my proposed addition these days, and below it in the past, but the correct form of my proposed addition is far more common than even 'commentator,' so I'm sure that's a factor and Oxford won't be listening to my letter either. (As I said, it's still largely considered incorrect, so I didn't really expect anything. I'm just weirdly passionate about it, so I gave it a shot.)
> At any rate, the inclusion of 'commenter' in Oxford but not M-W suggests that perhaps Oxford is less prescriptive. But as you point out, of course they would be more prescriptive than not.
> Even if they can't include everything ever (wiktionary, being crowd-sourced and in effect unlimited in space, can come close and in fact includes my proposed addition with a note that it's often considered incorrect but without judgement) they could include more of the common informal forms that don't often make it into books/articles/studies/etc. than they do. But ultimately they are a resource that people turn to for advice on spelling and acceptable usage, so by nature they're prescriptive, even if they take popular usage into account. Which I think is what you were getting at.
> ...


The _OED_ lists _commenter_ as obsolete, though it also records that it's still frequently used, so I don't think it's a matter of being more or less prescriptive. I also don't think _commentator_ and _commenter_ are rival words. A _commentator_ is someone who writes a commentary (e.g., on a book) or provides a running spoken account of some event._ Commenter _is probably on the rise because online media have created comments sections on articles. It's only natural (in English, anyway) to form agent nouns with -er for a new thing than to lump the new thing under an existing usage that doesn't fit--online comments aren't really commentaries, so commenters aren't really commentators.

As for informal usage, no dictionary has the time and resources to hunt down informal usages, especially since the vast majority will have disappeared or gone out of fashion before the dictionary is ever updated.


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## Guest (Nov 15, 2017)

WHDean said:


> _ Commenter _is probably on the rise because online media have created comments sections on articles. It's only natural (in English, anyway) to form agent nouns with -er for a new thing than to lump the new thing under an existing usage that doesn't fit--online comments aren't really commentaries, so commenters aren't really commentators.


THIS^^ is exactly how I would describe the use of 'commenters'


----------



## Lyndawrites (Aug 7, 2011)

No doubt someone will tell me I'm wrong (it's a regular occurrence   ) but, as far as I'm concerned, there is no such word as...cheater. It is simply cheat, verb and noun.

Except when it's spelled cheetah, but that's a whole 'nother thing.


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

anyways
towards
forwards
backwards


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

I think it's confession time  .

I once wrote about a character building a pigeon coup. 

I also had a character doing her upmost.  

This was in the early days. Fortunately my editor spotted them before the manuscript went to a publisher.


----------



## Vale (Jul 19, 2017)

The Bass Bagwhan said:


> I have a question... really. In Oz we're rarely against the idea of having "a couple of beers". But a lot of US writers will only drink "a couple beers". They drop the "of".
> 
> Is this a colloquialism or regional dialect thing? Is it common?


Sure, let's grab a couple of beers and watch the game. Looks like I would say "of" as an American. Maybe it's because it's 1am here, but trying to remove the "of" from a few sentences sounds really strange to me. "She has a couple cats," "there's a couple cars in the lot still." Maybe I should reconsider when I'm more awake, but those both sound super strange without the "of." You said it's the US that omits it and the OZ that includes it?


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Cherise said:


> anyways
> towards
> forwards
> backwards


Anyways, yes, but the rest? Perfectly correct here in Blighty.  So onwards and upwards, folks...


----------



## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> a pigeon coup.


I'd pay good money to see that.


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

PaulineMRoss said:


> Anyways, yes, but the rest? Perfectly correct here in Blighty.  So onwards and upwards, folks...


I've heard anyways used in dialogue. Not correct, no, but for dialogue it could be part of a character.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Doing a first pass read of the manuscript I finished earlier this week, I found my character peaking around a corner. Who knows what kind of stuff my editor will find.


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## Guest (Nov 17, 2017)

brkingsolver said:


> I found my character peaking around a corner.


I'm always appreciative of characters that do these things discreetly out of sight. (I was going to use a pet hate of mine 'discretely' but thought better of it).


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

brkingsolver said:


> Doing a first pass read of the manuscript I finished earlier this week, I found my character peaking around a corner. Who knows what kind of stuff my editor will find.


Hundreds of readers including me failed to notice that my character 'road away'. I think I'd read the book at least three times before I noticed. I also had a 13 month pregnancy in the first go round; husband went away in May, she had her baby the following June. Nobody noticed that, either, thank heavens.


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## Guest (Nov 17, 2017)

Doglover said:


> Hundreds of readers including me failed to notice that my character 'road away'. I think I'd read the book at least three times before I noticed. I also had a 13 month pregnancy in the first go round; husband went away in May, she had her baby the following June. Nobody noticed that, either, thank heavens.


I think my 'worst' was putting Chinese 'Samurai' in my first book.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

TobiasRoote said:


> I think my 'worst' was putting Chinese 'Samurai' in my first book.


Oh, yeah. I bet you didn't sell many in Japan!


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

I was doing a crossword this morning. The clue was '_wood formerly used for making longbows'_. I confidently filled in 'ewe'. It was only when the answer to the down clue ended in y that I realised my mistake


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Doglover said:


> Hundreds of readers including me failed to notice that my character 'road away'. I think I'd read the book at least three times before I noticed. I also had a 13 month pregnancy in the first go round; husband went away in May, she had her baby the following June. Nobody noticed that, either, thank heavens.


Sounds like a classic case of infidelity to me.


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## Paranormal Kitty (Jun 13, 2017)

Doglover said:


> Hundreds of readers including me failed to notice that my character 'road away'. I think I'd read the book at least three times before I noticed. I also had a 13 month pregnancy in the first go round; husband went away in May, she had her baby the following June. Nobody noticed that, either, thank heavens.





TobiasRoote said:


> I think my 'worst' was putting Chinese 'Samurai' in my first book.


Now I'm less worried about whatever I might have screwed up regarding the heart transplant aspect in my book. I got all my information about it from a soap opera (not the best source of research material), but I did take out the scene where he had like five cups of coffee because a beta reader told me that would probably kill him IRL.


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## Word Fan (Apr 15, 2015)

brkingsolver said:


> I found my character peaking around a corner.


Nowadays it's "Beijing."


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

Mylius Fox said:


> Leverage is one of the greatest verbs of all time, IMHO.


Only if you can optimize what you've leveraged. In a best-of-class manner with bleeding-edge technology.


----------



## Guest (Nov 17, 2017)

Is it just me or do these damned commas breed when you're not looking.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Jim Johnson said:


> Only if you can optimize what you've leveraged. In a best-of-class manner with bleeding-edge technology.


Don't forget the value-added component by the power user looking for a paradigm shift.

BTW, I never heard of _bleeding-edge_ technology. Heard plenty about _leading_-edge, though. 

I always hated the phrase _value-added_. I thought everything done in business was supposed to "add value."


----------



## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Jena H said:


> BTW, I never heard of _bleeding-edge_ technology. Heard plenty about _leading_-edge, though.
> 
> I always hated the phrase _value-added_. I thought everything done in business was supposed to "add value."


Bleeding edge is when you believe the salesman, install brand new, untested technology, and it crashes your business. The term was coined by customers of Microsoft.


----------



## Rose Andrews (Jun 1, 2017)

Doglover said:


> Hundreds of readers including me failed to notice that my character 'road away'. I think I'd read the book at least three times before I noticed. I also had a 13 month pregnancy in the first go round; husband went away in May, she had her baby the following June. Nobody noticed that, either, thank heavens.


LOL!! Omg the poor woman!

I had a character talk about going to an interview when it was really a blind date. Eek!


----------



## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

According to an article in today's paper, a local candidate for mayor said that City Hall corruption has "cast a spell over the city."  The context was the tainting of the city's reputation and erosion of trust in city government. So I think the correct phrase is: "cast a pall over the city."

However, the candidate may not have been entirely wrong, considering that corruption in my city centers around bribery. The definitions of "cast a spell" include "to intrigue and delight someone."  I can see how some of our local City Hall officials were intrigued and delighted when a person seeking city work contracts dangled envelopes full of thousands in cash under his/her noses.


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## PearlEarringLady (Feb 28, 2014)

Doglover said:


> I also had a 13 month pregnancy in the first go round; husband went away in May, she had her baby the following June. Nobody noticed that, either, thank heavens.


LOL! This is brilliant. And would be perfect for one of my epic fantasies... hmm, ponders the possibilities...


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Another case of an English second language speaker not hearing correctly (probably due to accents). A hug saw instead of a hacksaw.


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## Guest (Nov 18, 2017)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Another case of an English second language speaker not hearing correctly (probably due to accents). A hug saw instead of a hacksaw.


could be a hug[e] saw? I see this type of error a lot where a word is still a word even when there's a letter missing. Everyone misses those (except me apparently.)


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

TobiasRoote said:


> could be a hug[e] saw? I see this type of error a lot where a word is still a word even when there's a letter missing. Everyone misses those (except me apparently.)


It was a workman who sent a message asking if he'd left his hug saw behind


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Alix Adale said:


> The next time Google tells me to replace "all right" with "alright" I'm filing a class action lawsuit.


I hear aswell as one word all the time, with the emphasis on AS, instead of as well. Expect to see it in print soon


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

PaulineMRoss said:


> LOL! This is brilliant. And would be perfect for one of my epic fantasies... hmm, ponders the possibilities...


Help yourself


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## Linn (Feb 2, 2016)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> It was a workman who sent a message asking if he'd left his hug saw behind


I see that as just a typo. If your fingers slide one key to the left jig saw becomes hug saw.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Linn said:


> I see that as just a typo. If your fingers slide one key to the left jig saw becomes hug saw.


Maybe that is the answer  But it was a hacksaw and not a jigsaw that he used.


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## Valerie A. (Dec 31, 2016)

I read and hear this all the time: "orientate" instead of "orient" (verb). What gives? And what next: orientatate?


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## Spin52 (Sep 6, 2015)

Valerie A. said:


> I read and hear this all the time: "orientate" instead of "orient" (verb). What gives? And what next: orientatate?


I think you'll hear 'orient' in the US and 'orientate' in the UK. I first noticed it when I moved to the UK. Sort of like the extra letter in aluminum/aluminium.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Spin52 said:


> I think you'll hear 'orient' in the US and 'orientate' in the UK. I first noticed it when I moved to the UK. Sort of like the extra letter in aluminum/aluminium.


My dictionary agrees with this . I'm from the UK and would always say 'orientate'. The other would be The Orient.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Another one that I hear all the time and that drives me nuts, has now crept into print. "You coming to work, aren't you?" "You in Denver, aren't you?" "We going to the movies." 
It was bad enough when you're was your, now we don't even have that  .


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

_Orient_ and _orientate_ arise from the way French (and Latin) verbs are anglicized, which is usually done by adding the -ate suffix to the French verb stem: _creer_ becomes create, _separer_ becomes separate, _isoler_ becomes isolate, _participer_ becomes participate, and so on. Some words don't follow the pattern. _Interpret_ is another one. The pattern says_ interpretate_, but it's not used in British or American English. Yet _interpretative_ is still accepted usage (along with _interpretive_). I don't know how much this has to do with differences in the speakers and how much simply to chance.


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## Valerie A. (Dec 31, 2016)

WHDean said:


> _Orient_ and _orientate_ arise from the way French (and Latin) verbs are anglicized, which is usually done by adding the -ate suffix to the French verb stem: _creer_ becomes create, _separer_ becomes separate, _isoler_ becomes isolate, _participer_ becomes participate, and so on. Some words don't follow the pattern. _Interpret_ is another one. The pattern says_ interpretate_, but it's not used in British or American English. Yet _interpretative_ is still accepted usage (along with _interpretive_). I don't know how much this has to do with differences in the speakers and how much simply to chance.


That makes sense, thank you.


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

Read the first chapter promo for a friend's upcoming tradpub book, and there were two instances of "he reasoned" at the start of two paragraphs within four paragraphs, and a misuse of 'racked' for 'wracked'. I didn't have the heart to ask if the promo was the final copy-edited version or if it still needed to go through proofing.


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## Paranormal Kitty (Jun 13, 2017)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Another one that I hear all the time and that drives me nuts, has now crept into print. "You coming to work, aren't you?" "You in Denver, aren't you?" "We going to the movies."
> It was bad enough when you're was your, now we don't even have that .


If it's in dialogue, that's just how the character talks. It's a feature of some dialects.


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## RN_Wright (Jan 7, 2014)

_Jive_ and _Jibe_.

Jive is jargon, music, or dance related.

Jibe (non-nautical) means to fit or agree with. A lot of people say jive when they mean jibe. "That jives with my experience."


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## crebel (Jan 15, 2009)

RN_Wright said:


> _Jive_ and _Jibe_.
> 
> Jive is jargon, music, or dance related.
> 
> Jibe (non-nautical) means to fit or agree with. A lot of people say jive when they mean jibe. "That jives with my experience."


Learn something new every day. I hang my head in shame to admit I have misused this word/phrase as long as I can remember.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Valerie A. said:


> I read and hear this all the time: "orientate" instead of "orient" (verb). What gives? And what next: orientatate?


This bothers me, also. Similar to this, which (silly confession time!) I hear on old Perry Mason reruns, is _relevancy_ as opposed to _relevance._


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## alexabooks (Dec 3, 2016)

I may have found my favorite thread in the whole world


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Jena H said:


> This bothers me, also. Similar to this, which (silly confession time!) I hear on old Perry Mason reruns, is _relevancy_ as opposed to _relevance._


According to the _OED_, Latin actions nouns adopted into English through French originally used the French suffixes -ance or -ence, depending on the verbal root (e.g., prudence, elegance, relevance). These words could connote an action, process, quality, state, or condition. Later on, English writers adopted Latin and French words with the -ancy or -ency suffix specifically for expressing the quality, state, or condition. Sometimes, the -ance/-ence words were refashioned as -ancy/-ency words and distinguished in sense from the earlier form. The only pair I can recall off the top of my head is _resilience_ and _resiliency_. Some psychologist use resilience for the psychological process and resiliency for the quality of being resilient.

As for _relevance/relevancy_, _Garner's Modern American Usage _says relevance is preferred in British and American English. A Google Ngram search supports that conclusion. Nonetheless, I have found _relevancy_ in legal dictionaries, so it may have more purchase there. But then Garner has also written a guide to legal usage, so the weight of evidence leans toward relevance as accepted for all uses.


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## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

RN_Wright said:


> _Jive_ and _Jibe_.
> 
> Jive is jargon, music, or dance related.
> 
> Jibe (non-nautical) means to fit or agree with. A lot of people say jive when they mean jibe. "That jives with my experience."


I've heard these used in two ways.

"Jive turkey," which is some weird 70s thing. And jib, which I presume is a form of jibe? "I like the cut of your jib!"


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## wilsonharp (Jun 5, 2012)

Abalone said:


> And jib, which I presume is a form of jibe? "I like the cut of your jib!"


"I like the cut of your jib" comes from sailing parlance. It would be a reference to the forward most sail of a ship, and that sail often identified the nationality of the ship. Therefore, a friendly ship would like the cut of the jib of one of their countryman's ship.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Abalone said:


> I've heard these used in two ways.
> 
> "Jive turkey," which is some weird 70s thing. And jib, which I presume is a form of jibe? "I like the cut of your jib!"


Not quite. We're dealing with three different words, each with a couple of meanings. I've summarized a bit:

*Jive 1* (noun, verb, and adjective): Misleading, empty, or pretentious talk (e.g., "talking jive"), being pretentious (e.g., "jive turkey"), or taunting someone (i.e., "Stop jiving me").

*Jive 2* (noun and verb): Dancing to swing music or other lively dancing; e.g., "We did the jive all night." "We jived all night long."

*Jib 1 *(noun and verb): A triangular sail on a ship (noun); a projecting arm or crane on certain other machines (noun); and pulling a sail from one side of the vessel to the other (verb).

*Jib 2* (noun): appearance, style; hence, the idiom "I like the cut of your jib."

*Jibe 1* (noun and verb): taunt, tease, or sneer at someone; e.g., "Stop jibing me."

*Jibe 2* (verb): To be in harmony with; e.g., "They all jibe with one another."


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

I can never decide between a tumble-dryer or a tumble-drier. According to the dictionary, both are acceptable.

I also have a problem with flys and flies. I don't think 'flys' is acceptable.

FLY noun [ C ] INSECT plural FLIES

FLIES When a bird, insect or aircraft flies, it moves through the air
He's extremely irritable - he flies off the handle at the slightest thing.

2. FLIES [ plural ] UK for fly (TROUSERS)

There are many more entries for fly, but none with 'flys'.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Just seen this doing the rounds as a huge pink poster .


Australias womens rugby team the Jillaroos beat Canadas Ravens 88 to nil in the world womens rugby league test today.


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## Spin52 (Sep 6, 2015)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Just seen this doing the rounds as a huge pink poster .
> 
> 
> Australias womens rugby team the Jillaroos beat Canadas Ravens 88 to nil in the world womens rugby league test today.


They obviously didn't want to waste any space on apostrophes.


----------



## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

Spin52 said:


> They obviously didn't want to waste any space on apostrophes.


Can't expect much from a country full of convicts.

Kidding!


----------



## Mylius Fox (Jun 2, 2014)

Valerie A. said:


> I read and hear this all the time: "orientate" instead of "orient" (verb). What gives? And what next: orientatate?


Orientate as a verb goes back to the mid-nineteenth century, apparently. I've never noticed anyone ever using "orient" as a verb, even though I'm from the States...


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Mylius Fox said:


> Orientate as a verb goes back to the mid-nineteenth century, apparently. I've never noticed anyone ever using "orient" as a verb, even though I'm from the States...


I've never heard that either. The word is orientate, at least it is in the United Kingdom.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Mylius Fox said:


> I've never noticed anyone ever using "orient" as a verb, even though I'm from the States...


Check the Corpus of Contemporary American English. You'll find the verb form is pretty common:

https://corpus.byu.edu/coca/


----------



## Mylius Fox (Jun 2, 2014)

WHDean said:


> Check the Corpus of Contemporary American English. You'll find the verb form is pretty common:
> 
> https://corpus.byu.edu/coca/


That's what's so weird about it; I'm pretty sure my mind would've picked up on it if I'd seen it that way. *shrugs


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Mylius Fox said:


> Orientate as a verb goes back to the mid-nineteenth century, apparently. I've never noticed anyone ever using "orient" as a verb, even though I'm from the States...


Really? I've heard it quite a bit over the years. No specific, exact-wording examples, but something like "he was able to orient himself by the sun's position," or "the house was oriented toward the mountain view." No reasonable person would use the word orientate in those situations.


----------



## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Mylius Fox said:


> That's what's so weird about it; I'm pretty sure my mind would've picked up on it if I'd seen it that way. *shrugs


When this happens to me, I look at the phrases or expressions the word appears in. That usually jogs my memory. _Orient_ is commonly used with reflexive pronouns (e.g., orient ourselves, orient himself, orient themselves), in orienteering (finding your way on land by map and compass) and the figurative sense of finding one's way or orienting oneself, and in astronomy (orient yourself to the night sky). You'll also see it used in compound adjectives like "service-oriented architecture," which has its own Wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service-oriented_architecture).

Ring any bells now?


----------



## Mylius Fox (Jun 2, 2014)

WHDean said:


> When this happens to me, I look at the phrases or expressions the word appears in. That usually jogs my memory. _Orient_ is commonly used with reflexive pronouns (e.g., orient ourselves, orient himself, orient themselves), in orienteering (finding your way on land by map and compass) and the figurative sense of finding one's way or orienting oneself, and in astronomy (orient yourself to the night sky). You'll also see it used in compound adjectives like "service-oriented architecture," which has its own Wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service-oriented_architecture).
> 
> Ring any bells now?


_Service-oriented_ definitely rang true, but "orient ourselves" sounds completely foreign to me. Maybe _this_ is why Microsoft Word always automatically detects my language as English (U.K.)...


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## Guest (Nov 23, 2017)

Mylius Fox said:


> _Service-oriented_ definitely rang true, but "orient ourselves" sounds completely foreign to me. Maybe _this_ is why Microsoft Word always automatically detects my language as English (U.K.)...


Nah! I'm UK and orient works for me in lots of situations. Although, I regularly come across words that I personally never use in sentences being used by others. It's great to see the way different people think in writing. Although the one thing I hate is repetition, so tend to use odd words judiciously for effect.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Mylius Fox said:


> _Service-oriented_ definitely rang true, but "orient ourselves" sounds completely foreign to me. Maybe _this_ is why Microsoft Word always automatically detects my language as English (U.K.)...


I was curious to see how common the verb orient is in thrillers, so I started with the also-boughts for your book and went on to look at a few other thriller writers. Of course, I could only check books that had previews on Google Books.

Mark Dawson has this line near the beginning of Chapter 2 of _Saint Death_:



> Time enough to orient himself properly.


On page 279 of his autobiography, _Shooter_, Jack Coughlin has this line:



> He called in the flanking companies to orient the battalion toward a technical university and the headquarters of the Iraqi air force.


Nelson DeMille seems to like the word. From _Up Country_:



> Susan and I got out, and I looked around, trying to orient myself.


Nelson DeMille, _The Talbot Odyssey_,



> Brooklyn was also the Borough of Churches, and Abrams was always able to orient himself by the dozens of familiar steeples whose clocks also gave him the time.


Nelson DeMille, _The Quest: A Novel_,



> Purcell glanced at the map, then looked through the surrounding Plexiglas to orient himself.


James Patterson, _Private L.A.,_



> She tried to orient herself based on her movements after she'd left Jennifer Harlow's closet, tried to figure out where the window faced.


As you can see, most are orient plus a reflexive pronoun. I'm betting you notice the next time you come across the word.


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## Mylius Fox (Jun 2, 2014)

WHDean said:


> I was curious to see how common the verb orient is in thrillers, so I started with the also-boughts for your book and went on to look at a few other thriller writers. Of course, I could only check books that had previews on Google Books.
> 
> Mark Dawson has this line near the beginning of Chapter 2 of _Saint Death_:
> 
> ...


Yipes, I've read one by DeMille and one by Dawson, but not those in particular. When I have some spare time I'll have to go through my Kindle's "read" folder and search everything.  I'm curious if it's just something for which I've had blinders on, or if by some weird fluke life has sheltered me from it.


----------



## AnnaB (May 14, 2016)

The palate/palette/pallet cleanser is one that's popped up a few times over the last months.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

WHDean said:


> When this happens to me, I look at the phrases or expressions the word appears in. That usually jogs my memory. _Orient_ is commonly used with reflexive pronouns (e.g., orient ourselves, orient himself, orient themselves), in orienteering (finding your way on land by map and compass) and the figurative sense of finding one's way or orienting oneself, and in astronomy (orient yourself to the night sky). You'll also see it used in compound adjectives like "service-oriented architecture," which has its own Wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service-oriented_architecture).
> 
> Ring any bells now?


I wonder if orient/orientate is regionally patchy. I know I didn't notice "orientate" 'til I was in grad school, and when I first noticed it, it sounded so weird to me that I thought it was an error. So I clearly grew up in an ocean of "orient."


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Becca Mills said:


> I wonder if orient/orientate is regionally patchy. I know I didn't notice "orientate" 'til I was in grad school, and when I first noticed it, it sounded so weird to me that I thought it was an error. So I clearly grew up in an ocean of "orient."


^This^ I wonder if orientate is some kind of weird eastern affectation that's a hangover of their lost association with England. In the west, I've never heard it.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

brkingsolver said:


> ^This^ I wonder if orientate is some kind of weird eastern affectation that's a hangover of their lost association with England. In the west, I've never heard it.


I grew up in the east, albeit more to the south. One Midwestern parent, one northeastern parent. So ... dunno.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

brkingsolver said:


> ^This^ I wonder if orientate is some kind of weird eastern affectation that's a hangover of their lost association with England. In the west, I've never heard it.





Becca Mills said:


> I grew up in the east, albeit more to the south. One Midwestern parent, one northeastern parent. So ... dunno.


Yeah, east-coaster here too. And to this day orientate just sounds... off. Sort of like when someone thinks they know a word, but morph it just enough to sound legit even if it's not really a word. Like _truthiness,_ or _refudiate._


----------



## jasonbladd (Dec 22, 2015)

I hope you're going to talk to this a little more with a few replies


----------



## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

[quote ]
The word is tuition; not intuition.
[/quote]

The other person was making a good joke since all intuition is private. Public intuition sounds like a great idea for a fantasy novel, though. "Let us gather for public intuition. Please join hands..."]

My major grammar peeve is:

I snuck into the attack. [Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! Like bring, brang, brung is wrong.]

I sneaked into the attack. [This is the correct form because sneak is a regular verb. Why make a regular verb irregular?]

There is also this mistake:

He is taller than me. [wrong]
He is taller than I am. [Or, He is taller than I.]
He likes her better than me. [So you are jealous? If so, it's correct. If that's not what you mean, then it is incorrect.]
He likes her better than I like her. [Or, He likes her better than I do.]


----------



## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

Vale said:


> As a small child I always used to say "I could care less.... but I'm not sure how."


     I love it.


----------



## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

Philip Gibson said:


> Do Americans really say, "He dove into the swimming pool"?
> 
> Seems really odd to me.


Yep.

He might also have dived into a river or the ocean, but those in the middle of the country most likely have to make do with a swimming pool.

Biscuits for cookies always strikes my American ear as odd, but c'est la vie.

Americans are also dreadfully prone to snucking about. Snuck puts me in torments.


----------



## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

GeneDoucette said:


> "should of" instead of should have.
> 
> this makes me nuts.


"Would of" is more of the same.


----------



## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

ImaWriter said:


> That's actually a very common idiom where I live. At least with the older generation.


It's supposed to be "put someone through the wringer." As in "wring them out," like you do to laundry if you have to do it by hand.


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## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

Doglover said:


> A ringer is an old fashioned machine for squeezing the surplus water out of washing. My mum used to use one; it was a big thing with wooden rollers and a handle. In other words, putting someone through the ringer means to squeeze them dry.


Not "ringer"! "Wringer" It is spelled with a _w_.


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## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

Sue Ann C. said:


> A common error, even in newspapers and on TV: John Jones _hung_ himself. No, John Jones _hanged_ himself.
> 
> People are hanged, clothes are hung. (I'm not sure about animals though.)


Yes, the different words for people doing it is interesting.

You rear children. You raise chickens and crops.

You pat your hair. You pet your cat.

You sit in the chair. You set your teapot or hamster on the table.


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## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

Wayne Stinnett said:


> Correct: Tom went along with me and Joe.
> 
> Not correct: Tom went along with Joe and I.
> 
> ...


Sorry, eh, but the correct form is: Tom went along with Joe and me. One always puts one last in grammar as well as in courtesy.


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## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

GeneDoucette said:


> I had a reader take me to task for using 'snuck' instead of 'sneaked'. According to every online resource I've looked at since I received the complaint, either one is acceptable.


That was me! I love your books, but I hate snuck. Snuck sounds awful and really is bad grammar. Sneaked, sneaked, sneaked is the way to go.

I really like your tv shows, too.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

CynthiaClay said:


> Not "ringer"! "Wringer" It is spelled with a _w_.


You do realise that was pointed out and accepted several pages ago? As to the intuition thing, the poster agreed that he had missed it the first time. Do keep up.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

CynthiaClay said:


> That was me! I love your books, but I hate snuck. Snuck sounds awful and really is bad grammar. Sneaked, sneaked, sneaked is the way to go.
> 
> I really like your tv shows, too.


 Lots of people use 'snuck' in dialogue. I wouldn't use it in narrative, certainly, but in dialogue it is perfectly acceptable.


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## mjl1966 (Feb 15, 2017)

I would have told him to lie down.  

He would have probably said, "I could of laid down."  

But I would have told him he lay down that night, even if he were lying about it.  He did lie about it, actually.  Yes, he lied.  He lay there, even as he lay the pillow next to him.  

Then, quoth I, "The Chicago Book of Style sayeth thusly: I may, indeed, begin a sentence with a conjunction."  Good enough for me.  

"But wait," he said, lying yet again about what he might have known, "you can't use fragments!"  "But, all the good authors do," I said, "even if they shouldn't."  

"Irregardless -" he began.  But I did not let him finish his thought and instead shot him dead and watched him lie down quietly, gurgling without being able to speak.  His row hewn, that is, roughly hoed, I would hear no more.  Nothing more would he say.  No thing would he again utter.

He lies there now, weeping.  

And I whisper to him, "Did I not warn you sir, not to engage me in elocutive combat?"

"But -"  He coughs.  He gags.  "You just made up a word that doesn't exist."  

"Indeed," I say.  "Is that not how language tomorrow becomes more than it was today?"


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## Gone 9/21/18 (Dec 11, 2008)

CynthiaClay said:


> Snuck puts me in torments.


Sorry. Every dictionary I've checked recognizes _snuck _as an acceptable past tense of _sneak_. For me _sneaked _sounds weird, and I'm not going to use it, just like I'm not going to use _orientate_. Or _weeped_. Jesus weeped when the sun shined. Sounds great, doesn't it? After all why use an irregular verb form when it's easier to just slap an _ed _on everything?

I dislike _that _where _who _should be used, but it's increasingly common. Ditto using _myself _instead of plain _me_, but I'm not caving to those either.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Just read this on a news website "Braking News!". Thought it might be a clever pun, but it wasn't


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Just read this on a news website "Braking News!". Thought it might be a clever pun, but it wasn't


Why does that not surprise me?


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## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

> "Heads up" (I gave him a heads-up? a head's-up? a heads up? a heads' up?
> For instance, I regularly see people complain about 'nauseous' meaning only 'causing nausea' and not 'feeling nauseated,' but both meanings have been standard for quite some time (see also 'decimate'). I usually advise the 'proper' or more traditional use, but don't fuss if someone declines it.


In the theater, when one of the fly beams is coming down (they hold large scenic cloths which are raised and lowered from the fly area above the stage) one yells, "Heads up!" so no one will get hit on the head by the fly beam. It means you should look up to make sure you are not under the fly beam. This phrase may originally come from the 14th Century sailors since fly rigging was adapted from Portuguese sail-rigging of the 14th century. It has become a general "Watch out!" sort of phrase.


> ('Nauseous' in particular interests me - its original meaning (1600s) was an adjective akin to a character trait. If you generally had a weak stomach and could be easily made to gag, you were described as nauseous, even if you were not _at that moment_ feeling sick to your stomach. Within a few decades, though, it was an adjective used to describe something that causes the feeling of nausea - which I guess also makes sense, because I always get a bit queasy when I look at someone else who's clearly about to barf.)


I've always gone by the print dictionairies's meaning of _nauseated_ means your are sick to your stomach; _nauseous_ means you make other people sick to their stomachs (as in something poison_ous_ poisons people). [By the way, I learned three different styles of possessive apostrophes when I was a school girl, so now I am not sure which one is right. I just always put the apostrophe and then an _s_.]

[/quote]


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## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

The Bass Bagwhan said:


> As against "local reporters", yes. Is that what you're asking? It can be a something of a coup for a foreign reporter to be allowed in certain situations and suggests an objective point of view.


It is very awkward. It would better be:

He is one of the few foreign reporters...
He is the only foreign reporter...
He is only one of the foreign reporters...

Each of the above means something different.


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## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

[quote ]
That's more of a problem for me when it comes to pronunciation. There are too many words I learned only from reading without ever hearing them. For instance, I first thought 'character' was pronounced with the initial 'ch' as in charcoal - and scene with the 'sc' as in 'escape.'
[/quote]

Yes, until recently I thought _hyperbole_ was pronounced,_ hyper bole_. I was flabbergasted that this weird word _hy per bo le _was the right way to say _hyperbole_.

Live and learn.


----------



## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

[quote ]
I'd call this an interesting discussion between "American vs British" or accepting that some words undergo an eventual modernising without necessarily blaming it on US influence. As the language evolves, we're dropping some of the more awkward practises and I reckon these are two good examples. Even for English author writing I recommend "among" and "while" as modern forms under common usage. "Programme" becomng "Program" is probably another.
[/quote]

American English is actually the older form of English than England's English is. Colonies tend to stay stuck in the language use of the time of colonization. Our English is more like Shakespeare's than the Queen's English is. na na na na nah! 

Another one of these to add to your list is_ toward/towards _but I don't recall who says which.


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## CynthiaClay (Mar 17, 2017)

[quote ]
I would not participate in maligning "snuck" users (of which I am one). People who make judgments about intellect/education based on dialect differences are dopes, not to put too fine a point on it.

FWIW, in some regions, the sneaked > snuck shift is advanced enough that "sneaked" is beginning to sound wrong, sort of like dived > dove. Well, maybe it's not quite that cemented, but it's getting there. See ...

In cases like sneaked/snuck, writers have to decide which side of the language shift they're going to go with. Dictionaries might help them make informed choices, but they generally won't give a straightforward "right or wrong" kind of verdict. Now, if you confuse "lugubrious" with "lubricious," a dictionary can give you a straightforward verdict. That's the kind of problem dictionaries are intended to solve.
[/quote]

For historical novels, and for fantasies set in lets-pretend-historical times, the use of _sneaked_, _rear_ (for the raising of children) and the use of_ ly _adverbs help to give the older-language feel.

I loathe the word _snuck_ because it sounds so awful to my ear, but it probably will become the standard soon enough. I've never loathed the users of _snuck_. Why some _snuck_ users are my best friends and others are my favorite authors. It still makes my skin crawl though. My parents were in the theater and therefore unbelievably fussy about language. It had to sound like art in breath control, resonance, and grammar.


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## Mylius Fox (Jun 2, 2014)

I snuck in the muck like a Canuck hunting a duck, to buck my bad luck and learn to not give a f***.


----------



## Spin52 (Sep 6, 2015)

CynthiaClay said:


> In the theater, when one of the fly beams is coming down (they hold large scenic cloths which are raised and lowered from the fly area above the stage) one yells, "Heads up!" so no one will get hit on the head by the fly beam. It means you should look up to make sure you are not under the fly beam. This phrase may originally come from the 14th Century sailors since fly rigging was adapted from Portuguese sail-rigging of the 14th century. It has become a general "Watch out!" sort of phrase.


I've never heard it used as a 'watch out' phrase. I've always heard it as providing current information, for example, "I'm giving him the heads up on this project".


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Spin52 said:


> I've never heard it used as a 'watch out' phrase. I've always heard it as providing current information, for example, "I'm giving him the heads up on this project".


Yes, it's a forewarning or information before anyone else has it. Nothing whatever to do with flying beams.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Spin52 said:


> I've never heard it used as a 'watch out' phrase. I've always heard it as providing current information, for example, "I'm giving him the heads up on this project".


I think the use/connotation you mention is an evolution or offshoot of the literal "heads up" mentioned earlier, from the stage, or any number of other situations in which people might be made aware of things above them.


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## Gone 9/21/18 (Dec 11, 2008)

Spin52 said:


> I've never heard it [heads up] used as a 'watch out' phrase. I've always heard it as providing current information, for example, "I'm giving him the heads up on this project".


It's commonly used at horse shows (or at least it was, I haven't shown horses for years now) in the meaning of "watch out." Horses hit the ring at a high trot in English Pleasure and Driving classes, and as they approach the ring entrance, exhibitors yell it at people standing around and not paying attention.


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## Evenstar (Jan 26, 2013)

Isn't it both, though?

_Heads Up!_ is a warning that something is about to happen that you need to look out for. Whether that is a flying projectile or a motion that will be tabled at a board meeting.

But I always thought the correct nautical shout was "Abaft the beam!"


----------



## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

it's an app/game:


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## mjl1966 (Feb 15, 2017)

Have we already talked about fewer things not being less?


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

ellenoc said:


> It's commonly used at horse shows (or at least it was, I haven't shown horses for years now) in the meaning of "watch out." Horses hit the ring at a high trot in English Pleasure and Driving classes, and as they approach the ring entrance, exhibitors yell it at people standing around and not paying attention.


Not here in England; it's more likely to be 'get outta the bleedin' way!'


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

I was typing an email to a friend this morning and was suddenly stumped on this one: peeked (peaked) my interest. I think this is the first time in my long life I haven't had a clue which one it is.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Doglover said:


> I was typing an email to a friend this morning and was suddenly stumped on this one: peeked (peaked) my interest. I think this is the first time in my long life I haven't had a clue which one it is.


Horribly enough, it's "piqued." Three-homophone situations are totally unfair.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Becca Mills said:


> Horribly enough, it's "piqued." Three-homophone situations are totally unfair.


Oh My Giddy Aunt! I knew that! Of course I knew that and I'm not being sarcastic either. Now you put it in writing, I not only knew that, I would have known had I been writing it in a book. Ok, that's it. It's 7 am here which could be a reason but I very much fear it is my age and that I do not like!

I think I'll just go away and hide under the blanket for the rest of the day.


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## ThomasDiehl (Aug 23, 2014)

Becca Mills said:


> Horribly enough, it's "piqued." Three-homophone situations are totally unfair.


Wait, that's how that is pronounced? 
I always thought that phrase has peaked as in mountain peak (you know, the interest reached its highest there) while piqued was some sort of dialect thing for spiked and was pronounced pie-kd. I just never connected the two.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

ThomasDiehl said:


> Wait, that's how that is pronounced?
> I always thought that phrase has peaked as in mountain peak (you know, the interest reached its highest there) while piqued was some sort of dialect thing for spiked and was pronounced pie-kd. I just never connected the two.


According to my dictionary it is pronounced 'pee kid' in the US. Who knew?


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> According to my dictionary it is pronounced 'pee kid' in the US. Who knew?


I'm in the US, and I didn't know.  To me, it's pronounced _peeked_ (or_ peaked_, if one prefers).

Now, not to pile on to the confusion train, but there is a definition of "peaked" that means _looking ill or pale or drawn._ That version of the word is pronounced pea-kid.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jena H said:


> I'm in the US, and I didn't know.  To me, it's pronounced _peeked_ (or_ peaked_, if one prefers).
> 
> Now, not to pile on to the confusion train, but there is a definition of "peaked" that means _looking ill or pale or drawn._ That version of the word is pronounced pea-kid.


We say that someone looks peaky.


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## Evenstar (Jan 26, 2013)

Doglover said:


> We say that someone looks peaky.


I was going to say the same. I haven't heard of someone being peaked to mean off-colour, but Peaky is in common usage in the UK.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Doglover said:


> We say that someone looks peaky.





Evenstar said:


> I was going to say the same. I haven't heard of someone being peaked to mean off-colour, but Peaky is in common usage in the UK.


You both made me curious (_piqued_ my interest, you might say  ), as I know my mother (and others) have said so-and-so is "looking peaked." So I just did a quick dictionary check and both dictionary.com and merriam webster list a definition of _peaked_ as being pale or wan or sickly.

So, a slight variation in the word itself, but both having the same meaning.


----------



## trishjbutler (Mar 17, 2016)

Thanks!

I make a list of many of these I am prone to do, like mixing up 'maybe' and 'may be', then I search through my book using Ctrl+F (using Word here) and hopefully catch them all. I also search for " and look for pairs, so hopefully I don't miss those!

Another tip is to save your file as a PDF and listen to it - you can catch plenty of times when you typed 'the' instead of 'then' etc.

Happy Holidays

Trish


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

This blog post got me going: https://blogs.baruch.cuny.edu/cacophony/2011/11/09/stay-staying-sted-who-is-teaching-these-kids-grammar/

The guy overhears a dispute about the past tense of _stay_ (= _stayed_) between three teenaged girls. One insists that the past tense of _stay_ is _sted_, while the others aren't sure. The girl who's certain it's _sted_ asks him, and he points out that it's actually _stayed_. This leads him to reflect on the sorry state of grammar education and the bad influence of texting.

While he's right about the spelling, he's wrong about the pronunciation--which is probably what got the sted girl confused. Across large swaths of eastern Canada (and I'm guessing parts of the U.S. and the UK), _stayed_ is pronounced _sted_. I know this because the _sted_-sayers include me.

Now, the reason I got exercised is this: The blog is hosted by the Bernard L. Schwartz Communication Institute--yes, people who teach communications. You'd think they'd be a little more knowledgeable about regional dialects.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

WHDean said:


> This blog post got me going: https://blogs.baruch.cuny.edu/cacophony/2011/11/09/stay-staying-sted-who-is-teaching-these-kids-grammar/
> 
> The guy overhears a dispute about the past tense of _stay_ (= _stayed_) between three teenaged girls. One insists that the past tense of _stay_ is _sted_, while the others aren't sure. The girl who's certain it's _sted_ asks him, and he points out that it's actually _stayed_. This leads him to reflect on the sorry state of grammar education and the bad influence of texting.
> 
> ...


I come from London, England; stayed is pronounced as it is spelled - spaid. I've never heard it pronounced 'sted'.

Mind you, if you want a laugh, have a look at kdp forums and how many new writers, who think they have written a masterpiece, are complaining that they haven't had any 'sells'.


----------



## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Jena H said:


> You both made me curious (_piqued_ my interest, you might say  ), as I know my mother (and others) have said so-and-so is "looking peaked." So I just did a quick dictionary check and both dictionary.com and merriam webster list a definition of _peaked_ as being pale or wan or sickly.
> 
> So, a slight variation in the word itself, but both having the same meaning.


Well, cool. I've definitely heard the phrase "looking a little PEE-ked," but I don't think I've ever known which peak/peek/pique is in use there!


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Doglover said:


> I come from London, England; stayed is pronounced as it is spelled - spaid. I've never heard it pronounced 'sted'.
> 
> Mind you, if you want a laugh, have a look at kdp forums and how many new writers, who think they have written a masterpiece, are complaining that they haven't had any 'sells'.


Did you mean to type staid?


----------



## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Doglover said:


> I come from London, England; stayed is pronounced as it is spelled - spaid. I've never heard it pronounced 'sted'.
> 
> Mind you, if you want a laugh, have a look at kdp forums and how many new writers, who think they have written a masterpiece, are complaining that they haven't had any 'sells'.


Well, no, not in London. But regional accents in North America usually have antecedents in the UK: East Anglia in New England (and spreading westward), the Midlands in the Delaware Valley (and spreading westward), etc. Canada was strongly influenced by the Highland Scots and Irish as well. Like I said, I suspect it's more widespread than the east coast of Canada because most linguistic features are. But I can't be sure.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Did you mean to type staid?


Have you heard the word "parkade" (= building for parking cars) used in South Africa? I'm told it's a Canadian coinage (the Hudson's Bay company used it to name such buildings), but that it evolved (perhaps independently) in South Africa.

Even though the OED lists it as "chiefly U.S.," KBoards spellchecker doesn't recognize it, and it's not even recorded in Merriam-Webster online.


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Doglover said:


> I come from London, England; stayed is pronounced as it is spelled - spaid. I've never heard it pronounced 'sted'.
> 
> Mind you, if you want a laugh, have a look at kdp forums and how many new writers, who think they have written a masterpiece, are complaining that they *haven't had any 'sells'.*


I've seen and heard this also. Pretty annoying, especially since it might be the first wave of a new word and at some point acceptable usage.

And FTR, I've never heard or said the word _stayed_ pronounced as _sted_. I can't imagine why anyone would, when the word is clearly spelled the same as payed, played, delayed, prayed, etc. Spelled the same, pronounced to rhyme.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Did you mean to type staid?


Yes, I did. I was trying to emphasise the pronunciation; obviously it fell flat on its face (a bit like the first time I put a leash on a full grown giant dog who had never been out for a walk!) - Enough of that. STAYED is stayed; never heard it pronounced any other way.


----------



## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Doglover said:


> Yes, I did. I was trying to emphasise the pronunciation; obviously it fell flat on its face (a bit like the first time I put a leash on a full grown giant dog who had never been out for a walk!) - Enough of that. STAYED is stayed; never heard it pronounced any other way.


Oh, Gawd! Scrub that; I've just seen the p where there should have been a t. Yes, I did mean to type staid, but you see what is happening, don't you? The nearer I get to the big seven oh, the less the little grey cells renew and this is the result.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

WHDean said:


> Have you heard the word "parkade" (= building for parking cars) used in South Africa? I'm told it's a Canadian coinage (the Hudson's Bay company used it to name such buildings), but that it evolved (perhaps independently) in South Africa.
> 
> Even though the OED lists it as "chiefly U.S.," KBoards spellchecker doesn't recognize it, and it's not even recorded in Merriam-Webster online.


Yes, there are parking areas in Durban named as 'parkades'. I typed 'parkade' into my GPS and it came back with Pine Parkade .


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

WHDean said:


> Have you heard the word "parkade" (= building for parking cars) used in South Africa? I'm told it's a Canadian coinage (the Hudson's Bay company used it to name such buildings), but that it evolved (perhaps independently) in South Africa.
> 
> Even though the OED lists it as *"chiefly U.S.,"* KBoards spellchecker doesn't recognize it, and it's not even recorded in Merriam-Webster online.


Hmm, dictionary.com lists this word as Canadian in origin. 

I'm in the US and I've never heard the word before reading this post. Maybe other parts of the US (?), but even if so, I don't think it's close to being widespread use here.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

On BBC World 'Beyond 100 days' a quote appeared with '... declared it null & avoid...' . Don't know who made the error, but I hope someone at the BBC noticed it


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Jena H said:


> And FTR, I've never heard or said the word _stayed_ pronounced as _sted_. I can't imagine why anyone would, when the word is clearly spelled the same as payed, played, delayed, prayed, etc. Spelled the same, pronounced to rhyme.


The Tar Heel wonders why some folks done gone and talked all funny like. 



Jena H said:


> Hmm, dictionary.com lists this word as Canadian in origin.
> 
> I'm in the US and I've never heard the word before reading this post. Maybe other parts of the US (?), but even if so, I don't think it's close to being widespread use here.


According to the _Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles_, a Canadian English project centred at the University of British Columbia, the word originated in Canada, though there have a been a few recorded uses in the U.S. (http://www.dchp.ca/dchp2/pages/welcome):



> parkade < park (arc)ade DCHP-2 (December 2016)
> 
> •n. - Automotive
> 
> ...


This dictionary has been driving me nuts because I hadn't realized how many everyday words are exclusively Canadian (e.g., parkade) and how many meanings of common words differ between the U.S. and Canada. Evenstar mentioned _tabled_ up-thread. In Canada it means "to bring forward," but in the U.S. it means the opposite, "to postpone." Go figure.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

WHDean said:


> The Tar Heel wonders why some folks done gone and talked all funny like.
> 
> According to the _Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles_, a Canadian English project centred at the University of British Columbia, the word originated in Canada, though there have a been a few recorded uses in the U.S. (http://www.dchp.ca/dchp2/pages/welcome):
> 
> This dictionary has been driving me nuts because I hadn't realized how many everyday words are exclusively Canadian (e.g., parkade) and how many meanings of common words differ between the U.S. and Canada. Evenstar mentioned _tabled_ up-thread. In Canada it means "to bring forward," but in the U.S. it means the opposite, "to postpone." Go figure.


Under Robert's Rules of Order Newly Revised (the book used by most organizations), the subsidiary motion to lay on the table is properly used only when it is necessary to suspend consideration of a main motion in order to deal with another matter that has come up unexpectedly and which must be dealt with before the ...

Robert's Rules For Dummies. The subsidiary motion to postpone indefinitely is the Robert's Rules way of avoiding uncomfortable decisions; its adoption means that your group has agreed not to decide. The adoption of postpone indefinitely says it's better not to decide than to decide one way or the other.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Under Robert's Rules of Order Newly Revised (the book used by most organizations), the subsidiary motion to lay on the table is properly used only when it is necessary to suspend consideration of a main motion in order to deal with another matter that has come up unexpectedly and which must be dealt with before the ...
> 
> Robert's Rules For Dummies. The subsidiary motion to postpone indefinitely is the Robert's Rules way of avoiding uncomfortable decisions; its adoption means that your group has agreed not to decide. The adoption of postpone indefinitely says it's better not to decide than to decide one way or the other.


The Canadian meaning originates from our parliamentary procedures. We inherited the procedure and the meaning of _tabled_ from the British Parliament:

https://www.ourcommons.ca/About/Compendium/TypicalSittingDay/c_d_tablingdocuments-e.htm

The _table_ in "tabling a document" refers literally to the big table in the middle of the floor of the House of Commons. The Clerk of the House places the document on the table (= tables the document) for the House's consideration. This is where the generic sense of "bring forward" comes from. It was news to me that it meant the opposite in the U.S.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

WHDean said:


> The Tar Heel wonders why some folks done gone and talked all funny like.


Ha, don't get me started on Tar-Heel talk. I'm not a native Carolinian, so when I moved here I had to get used to people saying they've "got the headache," or they're "fixin' to go" visit with "Bobby and them," and will be back "Monday week."


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

WHDean said:


> This dictionary has been driving me nuts because I hadn't realized how many everyday words are exclusively Canadian (e.g., parkade) and how many meanings of common words differ between the U.S. and Canada. Evenstar mentioned _tabled_ up-thread. In Canada it means "to bring forward," but in the U.S. it means the opposite, "to postpone." Go figure.


That's odd, because tabled means to postpone here in the UK and our words are usually the same as in Canada. The one that pees me off is momentarily. Here it means for a moment; in the US it means in a moment. 'I will be there momentarily' is gibberish to an English person, as far as I'm concerned. 'I was momentarily stunned' would probably be gibberish to an American.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Doglover said:


> That's odd, because tabled means to postpone here in the UK and our words are usually the same as in Canada. The one that pees me off is momentarily. Here it means for a moment; in the US it means in a moment. 'I will be there momentarily' is gibberish to an English person, as far as I'm concerned. *'I was momentarily stunned' would probably be gibberish to an American.*


Strangely, no, it isn't. Oddly, I think for many Americans, momentarily can have both definitions you mention, either _for a moment,_ or _in a moment._


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jena H said:


> Strangely, no, it isn't. Oddly, I think for many Americans, momentarily can have both definitions you mention, either _for a moment,_ or _in a moment._


Oh, Lord! Next you'll be telling me that a car boot is not something you clamp onto your wheel!


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Jena H said:


> Ha, don't get me started on Tar-Heel talk. I'm not a native Carolinian, so when I moved here I had to get used to people saying they've "got the headache," or they're "fixin' to go" visit with "Bobby and them," and will be back "Monday week."


In case it wasn't obvious to everyone, I wasn't knocking Southern accents. I find the whole business interesting. I was recently watching videos about the so-called Hoi Toiders from the Outer Banks of North Carolina:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXs9cf2YWwg



Doglover said:


> That's odd, because tabled means to postpone here in the UK and our words are usually the same as in Canada. The one that pees me off is momentarily. Here it means for a moment; in the US it means in a moment. 'I will be there momentarily' is gibberish to an English person, as far as I'm concerned. 'I was momentarily stunned' would probably be gibberish to an American.


The dominant meanings of_ tabled _seem to be the same in the UK and Canada because tabling is common in both our parliaments. The postpone meaning is used in both countries too because, as Jan pointed out, that's the meaning in Robert's Rules. If you're thinking the postpone meaning is dominant, it's probably because you're more familiar with it for some reason. This Wikipedia page covers it, including an anecdote from Churchill about how the different senses of tabled caused confusion in a meeting with the U.S. officials:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_(parliamentary_procedure)

Here's a line from a Guardian story published a few days ago:



> In the week following the referendum, I *tabled a bill* calling for a referendum to give people the final say on the exit package, with an option to continue our EU membership if voters believed their reasonable expectations for Brexit hadn't been realised.


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

Going back to the definitions and pronunciation of peeked/peaked/piqued:

There is a type of fabric weave called pique, pronounced pee-kay. "Pique refers to a weaving style, normally used with cotton yarn, which is characterized by raised parallel cords or fine ribbing. It creates a fine textured surface that appears similar to a waffle weave. Commonly used for polo shirts." Source:

https://threadlogic.wordpress.com/2012/12/26/what-is-pique-and-how-is-it-pronounced/


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Bluebonnet said:


> Going back to the definitions and pronunciation of peeked/peaked/piqued:
> 
> There is a type of fabric weave called pique, pronounced pee-kay. "Pique refers to a weaving style, normally used with cotton yarn, which is characterized by raised parallel cords or fine ribbing. It creates a fine textured surface that appears similar to a waffle weave. Commonly used for polo shirts." Source:
> 
> https://threadlogic.wordpress.com/2012/12/26/what-is-pique-and-how-is-it-pronounced/


English is a minefield. Learning it as a second language must be one of the most frustrating languages to master.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

WHDean said:


> In case it wasn't obvious to everyone, *I wasn't knocking Southern accents.* I find the whole business interesting. I was recently watching videos about the so-called Hoi Toiders from the Outer Banks of North Carolina:
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXs9cf2YWwg
> 
> ...


Don't worry, I realize there was no criticism intended. However, it IS interesting that even within a single state, there can be such variation in pronunciations and word usage. I bet that many Carolinians in the piedmont or western part of the state wouldn't be familiar with the "hoi toid" dialect of the OB.


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## Eskimo (Dec 31, 2013)

It's spit and image. Not spitting image.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

David Chill said:


> It's spit and image. Not spitting image.


spitting image
nouninformal
the exact double of (another person or thing).
"she's the spitting image of her mum"

https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/spitting-image.html


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## LadyG (Sep 3, 2015)

A word that always bothers me is "conversate." Ugh. No, you _converse _with someone and have a _conversation_, but you do not _conversate_. Unfortunately, I argued about this one with a journalist friend and looked it up to prove my point . . . and discovered that I was wrong. Merriam-Webster says either way is correct.

It still makes me cringe when I hear it, though.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

David Chill said:


> It's spit and image. Not spitting image.


I think (not official knowledge, but just from some informal googling) that both terms may be acceptable. I read about this phrase once, and there are various theories as to the origin. I personally go with the theory that it developed from "spirit and image"... that is, that someone embodies another person in looks and behavior. This might have evolved into "spit and image" which further evolved into "spitting image." But who knows, I don't think there's a definitive answer.



LadyG said:


> A word that always bothers me is "conversate." Ugh. No, you _converse _with someone and have a _conversation_, but you do not _conversate_. Unfortunately, I argued about this one with a journalist friend and looked it up to prove my point . . . and discovered that I was wrong. Merriam-Webster says either way is correct.
> 
> It still makes me cringe when I hear it, though.


Yikes, I hadn't heard that one, but I agree: Ugh. Sounds (again) like a word that has been coined from existing words, and which does NOT need to exist.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Jena H said:


> Don't worry, I realize there was no criticism intended. However, it IS interesting that even within a single state, there can be such variation in pronunciations and word usage. I bet that many Carolinians in the piedmont or western part of the state wouldn't be familiar with the "hoi toid" dialect of the OB.


Yeah, same thing on the east coast of Canada. Accents vary within these small provinces. Yet you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference between residents of British Columbia on the far west coast and the accent of people from Toronto. (I was also listening to some Cajun French the other day. I was blown away that they still speak the same French spoken today by their cousins in Acadia, which differs from both Quebec French and Parisian French.)

On another note, I've been struggling with the audio version of Thomas Madden's history of the crusades. The narrator is terrible, but the worst must be his insistence on pronouncing the possessive plural _crusaders'_ with a _-zez_ at the end. The _crusader-zez vow_, the _crusader-zez mission_, the _crusader-zez retreat_, and on and on. You can image how many times it's said in a history of the crusades.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

David Chill said:


> It's spit and image. Not spitting image.


In whose language?


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

LadyG said:


> A word that always bothers me is "conversate." Ugh. No, you _converse _with someone and have a _conversation_, but you do not _conversate_. Unfortunately, I argued about this one with a journalist friend and looked it up to prove my point . . . and discovered that I was wrong. Merriam-Webster says either way is correct.
> 
> It still makes me cringe when I hear it, though.


Well, it's not one I've ever heard used in England. It sounds like a derivative word, like saying something is a bit 'suspect' or 'my bad' (which makes me grimace).


Jena H said:


> I think (not official knowledge, but just from some informal googling) that both terms may be acceptable. I read about this phrase once, and there are various theories as to the origin. I personally go with the theory that it developed from "spirit and image"... that is, that someone embodies another person in looks and behavior. This might have evolved into "spit and image" which further evolved into "spitting image." But who knows, I don't think there's a definitive answer.


Perhaps we should ask the writers of the wonderul tv send up comedy 'Spitting Image' which took the pee out of our politicians.


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

_Daily Mail_ is full of bloopers. Just saw this one, in an article about a celebrity and her stalkers: "Her show is a magnate for these guys."

Magnet, DM, magnet! That wasn't even a typo. Do they still employ proofreaders?


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Bluebonnet said:


> _Daily Mail_ is full of bloopers. Just saw this one, in an article about a celebrity and her stalkers: "Her show is a magnate for these guys."
> 
> Magnet, DM, magnet! That wasn't even a typo. Do they still employ proofreaders?


Yes, but they are not required to know the Queen's English. Probably school kids on work experience.

When I had my house up for sale, I got a letter through the door from a local estate agent which insisted they could get me the 'illusive' sale. I emailed them back, pointing out that if they couldn't be sure their communications were spelled correctly, I doubted they could support that statement.


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

I know that forum comments are casual and are not supposed to be critiqued for errors, but I couldn't resist this one. (It wasn't from this forum.)

"I feed Ferrell cats."


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Bluebonnet said:


> I know that forum comments are casual and are not supposed to be critiqued for errors, but I couldn't resist this one. (It wasn't from this forum.)
> 
> "I feed Ferrell cats."


What an admission! You really shouldn't feed someone else's cat; Mr Ferrell won't like it at all!


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Bluebonnet said:


> _Daily Mail_ is full of bloopers. Just saw this one, in an article about a celebrity and her stalkers: "Her show is a magnate for these guys."
> 
> Magnet, DM, magnet! That wasn't even a typo. Do they still employ proofreaders?


Wow. I can see someone using _magnet_ when _magnate_ is the correct word ("the well-known shipping magnet"), but not the other way around. The Daily Mail must be a real hoity-toity publication.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Atrocious errors started appearing in newspapers about 10 years ago when they all downsized to compete on the web. The first people to go were the copyeditors. One of my favourite mistakes was a fact-check note that got left in text in an op-ed in the National Post--something like



> ...the Bob Jones, Member of Parliament for Toronto Centre [CHECK], claimed that...


Since they'd fired all the copyeditors, there was no one left to CHECK.


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## Decon (Feb 16, 2011)

WHDean said:


> Atrocious errors started appearing in newspapers about 10 years ago when they all downsized to compete on the web. The first people to go were the copyeditors. One of my favourite mistakes was a fact-check note that got left in text in an op-ed in the National Post--something like
> 
> Since they'd fired all the copyeditors, there was no one left to CHECK.


It's been happening longer that 10yrs. I had a relative who worked as a copyeditor for a local newspaper over 35 years ago. I hated it when he visited got his hands on the national newspaper before me. Every page was covered with copyeditors shorthand symbols and notations that they used to mark up or correct errors, making the newspaper unreadable when he'd finished. That was true of the Daily Telegraph then, and it is still so.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Decon said:


> It's been happening longer that 10yrs. I had a relative who worked as a copyeditor for a local newspaper over 35 years ago. I hated it when he visited got his hands on the national newspaper before me. Every page was covered with copyeditors shorthand symbols and notations that they used to mark up or correct errors, making the newspaper unreadable when he'd finished. That was true of the Daily Telegraph then, and it is still so.


I think I already mentioned the newspaper tv listing of Agatha Christie's Murder at the Vickeridge.


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## EllieDee (May 28, 2017)

Haha, this is a fun thread! Why haven't I seen it before?

The worst blooper I saw was a chapter title. They called it 'Vinaigrette' not 'Vignette.' And it was for a *print book*! I just know the author's facepalming over that one.

The worst blooper I (almost) did was for web content for a client. I meant to type something along the lines of "Mr. X earned over $1 million annually." What I actually typed was "Mr. X earned over $1 million anally." Which really changed the tenor of the biography, you know?

The typo caught my eye just as my mouse hovered over the 'submit document' button. And that, boys and girls, is why you can't trust spellcheck.


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## Word Fan (Apr 15, 2015)

EllieDee said:


> Haha, this is a fun thread! Why haven't I seen it before?
> 
> The worst blooper I saw was a chapter title. They called it 'Vinaigrette' not 'Vignette.' And it was for a *print book*! I just know the author's facepalming over that one.
> 
> ...


Spellcheck works just fine... for spelling. What they should have is "rightwordcheck" for vocabulary that would nudge you and say "Did you really mean to say that?" Perhaps with the coming revolution in Artificial Intelligence someone will do it.


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## Christine Clayfield (Dec 12, 2017)

Forward = moving onwards or ahead
Foreword = an introduction to a book

Farther = physical distance
Further = in addition to

Imply = suggest
Infer =deduce

Affect = have an effect on 
Effect = the result of something

Lose = to misplace or be deprive of something
Loose =not attached properly


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## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

Oh, dear lord. I just read this in a mystery book that was published by a big six. 

"The garden was teaming with flies."

T-E-A-M-I-N-G

Not T-E-E-M-I-N-G as it should be, but teaming. *shudder*


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

EllieDee said:


> The worst blooper I (almost) did was for web content for a client. I meant to type something along the lines of "Mr. X earned over $1 million annually." What I actually typed was "Mr. X earned over $1 million anally." Which really changed the tenor of the biography, you know?


Best typo ever?


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## LadyG (Sep 3, 2015)

Not actually a mistake, but something small that irritates me every time I see it in a book: "He thought to himself ..." Pulls me right out of the story and makes me want to ask the author just exactly whom else the character might have been thinking to. Unless the character is telepathic, _of course_ he's thinking to himself!


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Abalone said:


> Oh, dear lord. I just read this in a mystery book that was published by a big six.
> 
> "The garden was teaming with flies."
> 
> ...


Well I am reading a serious, historical non-fiction by an established and well known English historian. I have just choked over the phrase 'now there was no mail heir to succeed to the throne'.

It also speaks of the Princess of Wales and what he does.

I feel better now.


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## Guest (Jan 1, 2018)

then there is bore, boar and boor.  'The oafish bore' made me scratch my head a bit.


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## Valerie A. (Dec 31, 2016)

Doglover said:


> Well I am reading a serious, historical non-fiction by an established and well known English historian. I have just choked over the phrase 'now there was no mail heir to succeed to the throne'.


And no male hair either. What is to become of us?


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## ThomasDiehl (Aug 23, 2014)

Doglover said:


> Well I am reading a serious, historical non-fiction by an established and well known English historian. I have just choked over the phrase 'now there was no mail heir to succeed to the throne'.


Royal postage is serious business.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

I've just had a poster put on my Facebook page to let me know that a relative has 'pasted' away. Not the time to be correcting the spelling


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

Can't be repeated enough--when you send pitches or stories to an editor for consideration, spell-check the thing. The submission is your calling card, and any typos reflect poorly on your ability as a writer. Now that I'm an editor as well as a writer, I see this almost every day and wonder at the professionalism of some people.


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## RachelWollaston (Oct 9, 2016)

Your "brow"  is your forehead, NOT an eyebrow. If you write, "His brow lifted", are you saying his forehead elongated??


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

From a long-time author who's published dozens of books over the past 30 years, comes this wonderful sentence:
"If more wives did something, less men would behave in such a manner...."


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## notjohn (Sep 9, 2016)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I've just had a poster put on my Facebook page to let me know that a relative has 'pasted' away.


Oh, that's wonderful!


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I've just had a poster put on my Facebook page to let me know that a relative has 'pasted' away. Not the time to be correcting the spelling


Perhaps they meant to say 'wasted'


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I've just had a poster put on my Facebook page to let me know that a relative has 'pasted' away. Not the time to be correcting the spelling


People also say someone has "past" away.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Bluebonnet said:


> People also say someone has "past" away.


Sort of a derail, but... I was an adult before I ever heard of someone saying _passed,_ as in "His mother passed last weekend." I was used to hearing _passed away,_ so the first few times someone said a relative _passed,_ it was on the tip of my tongue to ask, "what did she pass? The bakery? Flower shop? The opportunity to join the Peace Corps?"

And to bring this post back on topic, the same book I quoted earlier (with "less husbands") also had a character say that someone _looked peaked,_ and should go take a nap.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Jeff Tanyard said:


> *Technically, that's the correct spelling, even though it looks weird. * "Pekid" is the "eye dialect" spelling, or phonetic spelling.
> 
> http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pekid
> 
> I prefer "pekid" myself, but YMMV.


Yes, it is correct, as discussed on this thread earlier. I was actually trying (and failing, I guess) to point out a _good_ example of word usage in the book, after the "less men" example of BAD word usage.  (If I read "pekid" I believe I would assume it was a typo or someone spelling phonetically, like when people write "per say" instead of "per se."  )


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jeff Tanyard said:


> Technically, that's the correct spelling, even though it looks weird. "Pekid" is the "eye dialect" spelling, or phonetic spelling.
> 
> http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pekid
> 
> I prefer "pekid" myself, but YMMV.


I've certainly never heard of any word 'pekid' and peaked in this context is not right anyway. It should have been peaky.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Jena H said:


> Sort of a derail, but... I was an adult before I ever heard of someone saying _passed,_ as in "His mother passed last weekend." I was used to hearing _passed away,_ so the first few times someone said a relative _passed,_ it was on the tip of my tongue to ask, "what did she pass? The bakery? Flower shop? The opportunity to join the Peace Corps?"


The first time I heard someone reply to "What happened to Alfred?" with the answer "He's late." I was most confused, until it dawned on me that Alfred had died.

I'm trying to get the road agency to adopt the slogan: "Better to be late than to become THE late - speed kills!"


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> The first time I heard someone reply to "What happened to Alfred?" with the answer "He's late." I was most confused, until it dawned on me that Alfred had died.
> 
> I'm trying to get the road agency to adopt the slogan: "Better to be late than to become THE late - speed kills!"


When I was teaching, and my pupils complained about someone breaking speed limits to get ahead of the learner driver, there were two things I would tell them. One was 'better to be late than late'.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Have just read this one in a letter 'it was a spare of the moment decision".


----------



## The 13th Doctor (May 31, 2012)

During the recent revival/pilot/what-have-you from Vic and Bob (90s british comedy double-act), I noticed that the name of the show, in large lettering at the back of the stage, read "Vic and *Bobs* Big Night Out".

However, I wouldn't be surprised if the lack of apostrophe was intentional.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Doglover said:


> I've certainly never heard of any word 'pekid' and peaked in this context is not right anyway. It should have been peaky.


_Peaked_ is every bit as correct (in the context of "wan, pale, sickly," etc.) as _peaky_, at least as far as major dictionaries are concerned. So it seems it's just a matter of common (regional) usage. For me--and apparently in a number of books I've read-- _peaked_ is common and usual.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jena H said:


> _Peaked_ is every bit as correct (in the context of "wan, pale, sickly," etc.) as _peaky_, at least as far as major dictionaries are concerned. So it seems it's just a matter of common (regional) usage. For me--and apparently in a number of books I've read-- _peaked_ is common and usual.


Not here in England, I don't think. The only peaked here is when something reaches its maximum. Unless, of course, it's peeked, which is what peeping Toms do!


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Doglover said:


> Not here in England, I don't think. The only peaked here is when something reaches its maximum. Unless, of course, it's peeked, which is what peeping Toms do!


Maybe it's not used there in England (as I mentioned: regional usage), but it's listed in dictionaries with that definition, including Merriam-Webster, Oxforddictionaries, and Cambridge.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Jena H said:


> Maybe it's not used there in England (as I mentioned: regional usage), but it's listed in dictionaries with that definition, including Merriam-Webster, Oxforddictionaries, and Cambridge.


Oxford lists _peaked_ as North American, _peaky _as British. _Peaked_ is pretty common in this part of Canada. You'll hear the redundant _peaked-looking _too.


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

When writing otherwise complete sentences, please try to not use U for 'you' or b4 for 'before'. Half-assed laziness is so gauche. Go all in one way or the other.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

I am going to drag this thread up again because I've come across a reason for uncertain writers to have problems with the apostrophe. I have just typed into my story 'five spoonfuls of sugar'. The wavy red line appeared beneath 'spoonfuls' so I checked to see what its problem was. It seems that Word thinks I need an apostrophe 'spoonful's'. 

Does anyone know what it's on about? Please? Seriously?


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## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

Doglover said:


> I am going to drag this thread up again because I've come across a reason for uncertain writers to have problems with the apostrophe. I have just typed into my story 'five spoonfuls of sugar'. The wavy red line appeared beneath 'spoonfuls' so I checked to see what its problem was. It seems that Word thinks I need an apostrophe 'spoonful's'.
> 
> Does anyone know what it's on about? Please? Seriously?


Word has a really bad record with apostrophes. The vast majority of the ones people pointed out to me as wrong, get that wavy blue or red line underneath them if I change them.

The problem is, when you're not sure, relying on Word to get it right is nothing but a crap-shoot.

And damn. Page 23 and I told myself I wasn't joining this thread!


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

But, Timothy, it's such a fun thread, and very informative.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Going back a bit it was always spoonsful.


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## Ebook Proofreading (Oct 11, 2017)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I'm trying to get the road agency to adopt the slogan: "Better to be late than to become THE late - speed kills!"


I like this slogan.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Doglover said:


> I am going to drag this thread up again because I've come across a reason for uncertain writers to have problems with the apostrophe. I have just typed into my story 'five spoonfuls of sugar'. The wavy red line appeared beneath 'spoonfuls' so I checked to see what its problem was. It seems that Word thinks I need an apostrophe 'spoonful's'.
> 
> Does anyone know what it's on about? Please? Seriously?





Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Going back a bit it was always spoonsful.


I just checked... Word put a *red* squiggly line under _spoonfuls_... meaning that it considers the word to be a spelling mistake. It put a *green* squiggly line under _spoonsful_... which to Word indicates a grammatical error.

Note: Kboards also puts a red squiggly line under _spoonsful_, so it doesn't like that word, either.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Jena H said:


> I just checked... Word put a *red* squiggly line under _spoonfuls_... meaning that it considers the word to be a spelling mistake. It put a *green* squiggly line under _spoonsful_... which to Word indicates a grammatical error.
> 
> Note: Kboards also puts a red squiggly line under _spoonsful_, so it doesn't like that word, either.


If you Google it you will find that it used to be spoonsful, but spoonfuls has now become common .

Passersby was also a problem.

As the noun-constructing suffix got attached to the verb part pass, making it passer, it is logical to chain the plural suffix -s after the first suffix. The by part is more of an additional particle for the word, I think it is even acceptable to write passers-by with a dash.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Doglover said:


> I am going to drag this thread up again because I've come across a reason for uncertain writers to have problems with the apostrophe. I have just typed into my story 'five spoonfuls of sugar'. The wavy red line appeared beneath 'spoonfuls' so I checked to see what its problem was. It seems that Word thinks I need an apostrophe 'spoonful's'.
> 
> Does anyone know what it's on about? Please? Seriously?


Five spoons of sugar is rather a lot  Unless you are making a cake.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Going back a bit it was always spoonsful.


Not in the east end of London it wasn't. Anyway, that wasn't what Word thought I should change it to; it wanted to put in an apostrophe and I'm still trying to work out why.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Doglover said:


> Not in the east end of London it wasn't. Anyway, that wasn't what Word thought I should change it to; it wanted to put in an apostrophe and I'm still trying to work out why.


This is just a case where the plural form isn't in Word's dictionary, so the program's taking its best two guesses on what you might've meant to spell that *is *in its dictionary. See the red line, not the green line, as Jena said.










Word's grammar-checker does suck, for sure, but it's not responsible for this particular suggestion.


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## Valerie A. (Dec 31, 2016)

What is the latest word on dangling clauses/participles/attributes? I was taught, and I feel in my gut, that they are both ugly and downright wrong. Yet I see them all the time. E.g. "Growing up, my hometown had only one brothel." Silly, I know, but you get the gist.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Valerie A. said:


> What is the latest word on dangling clauses/participles/attributes? I was taught, and I feel in my gut, that they are both ugly and downright wrong. Yet I see them all the time. E.g. "Growing up, my hometown had only one brothel." Silly, I know, but you get the gist.


Not sure what you mean really. If I was growing up, it would be my hometown, wouldn't it? Or I could say, 'when I was growing up, my hometown..' Or forget the 'growing up' bit altogether. My hometown is enough.

Of course, when I was growing up, I wouldn't have known what a brothel was!


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## ThomasDiehl (Aug 23, 2014)

Valerie A. said:


> What is the latest word on dangling clauses/participles/attributes? I was taught, and I feel in my gut, that they are both ugly and downright wrong. Yet I see them all the time. E.g. "Growing up, my hometown had only one brothel." Silly, I know, but you get the gist.


I don't think they are wrong per se but this one is a nice example of what could go wrong.
I mean, who was growing up back then, you or your hometown? The phrasing looks like it's your hometown that's doing the growing which is weird. However, the phrase does contain vital information about the setting (i.e. the timeframe relative to the narrator's).


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

Valerie A. said:


> What is the latest word on dangling clauses/participles/attributes? I was taught, and I feel in my gut, that they are both ugly and downright wrong. Yet I see them all the time. E.g. "Growing up, my hometown had only one brothel." Silly, I know, but you get the gist.


That partly depends on context and what sort of lyrical feel or metrical stress the writer is looking to present. Could be a speech pattern of that character to invert parts of their sentences that another character might say differently. Shakespeare and other writers (DEADWOOD's David Milch) use inversion a lot to put different stresses on different parts of sentences.

That sentence could mean a few different things, but without the context, it's harder to guess at. Could be an implied [When I was] at the beginning, if the character is talking about themselves, or it could be about when the hometown growing up.

Language is fun.


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## Valerie A. (Dec 31, 2016)

Doglover said:


> Not sure what you mean really. If I was growing up, it would be my hometown, wouldn't it? Or I could say, 'when I was growing up, my hometown..' Or forget the 'growing up' bit altogether. My hometown is enough.
> 
> Of course, when I was growing up, I wouldn't have known what a brothel was!


I was taught that there is only one way to say that the growing up was being done by me and not my hometown: "When I was growing up..." In my example, it is clearly and unequivocally (at least to me) the hometown that is growing up, which is of course absurd. But then I was taught by the grammar gestapo itself.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Valerie A. said:


> What is the latest word on dangling clauses/participles/attributes? I was taught, and I feel in my gut, that they are both ugly and downright wrong. Yet I see them all the time. E.g. "Growing up, my hometown had only one brothel." Silly, I know, but you get the gist.


I think you have to start with why the dangler dangles: If there's no connection between the participle phrase and the subject of the main clause, you've got a dangler. Of course, the line seems fuzzy in some real sentences because the subject needed by the participle can be latent in the real subject of the main clause. Your example sentence is one such case. Consider these two variations and you'll see what I mean. The first is dangler-free and second is a solid dangler:



> "Growing up, I lived in a town with only one brothel."
> "Growing up, the old hometown had only one brothel."


In the first, the subject _I_ did the growing up, so all's good. In the second, _the old hometown _is the subject of the sentence, but can't be the subject implied by the participle phrase--a clear case of a dangler. Now look at your sentence:



> "Growing up, my hometown had only one brothel."


This is a dangler, yes, because the subject of the sentence is _my hometown_, which can't grow up. But notice how the pronoun _my_ connotes the subject _I _that's implied by the participle. When you get these echoes of a proper subject latent in the real subject, the picture gets fuzzy, and some people don't appreciate the dangling. That is also why the danglers you find "in the wild" look more like your example than the dangler example I offered.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Valerie A. said:


> What is the latest word on dangling clauses/participles/attributes? I was taught, and I feel in my gut, that they are both ugly and downright wrong. Yet I see them all the time. E.g. "Growing up, my hometown had only one brothel." Silly, I know, but you get the gist.


These really bug me. I've put down any number of books after finding one of these on p. 1. For me, it's a big, flashing "not edited"/"poorly edited" sign.

For those who don't see the error, it's wrong because what it literally means is, "While my hometown was growing up, it only had one brothel" (... but now that it's all grownup, it has three?). That's not what the sentence is supposed to mean. It's supposed to mean, "When *I* was growing up, my hometown only had one brothel." But the "I" didn't get in there, so the subject in the main sentence ("my hometown") has to apply to both parts, and it doesn't work.

When you attach a modifier to a sentence, and that modifier does not state its subject explicitly, the modifier has to have the same subject as the sentence it's attached to. You can't swap subjects at the comma unless both subjects are stated explicitly.


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## Valerie A. (Dec 31, 2016)

Becca Mills said:


> These really bug me. I've put down any number of books after finding one of these on p. 1. For me, it's a big, flashing "not edited"/"poorly edited" sign.
> 
> For those who don't see the error, it's wrong because what it literally means is, "While my hometown was growing up, it only had one brothel" (... but now that it's all grownup, it has three?). That's not what the sentence is supposed to mean. It's supposed to mean, "When *I* was growing up, my hometown only had one brothel." But the "I" didn't get in there, so the subject in the main sentence ("my hometown") has to apply to both parts, and it doesn't work.
> 
> When you attach a modifier to a sentence, and that modifier does not state its subject explicitly, the modifier has to have the same subject as the sentence it's attached to. You can't swap subjects at the comma unless both subjects are stated explicitly.


Thank you, Becca. Both for your explanation, and for making me feel less alone in this.


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

Sort of on the subject of brothels ...

The New York Post, that shining example of fine journalism, has a gossipy article today about a wife suing her husband because he forced her out of their jointly owned business. He blew a lot of the company's money on strippers. The lawsuit mentions his "using her and [the company's] funds to fund his lavish, bacchanalian and debaucherous lifestyle..."

Debaucherous? Is that even a word?


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## Jim Johnson (Jan 4, 2011)

Bluebonnet said:


> Debaucherous? Is that even a word?


Yup.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

This is third example in about a week  

My new dentist performed an improper filling which lead to an infection and pain, and now requires a root canal.

It's LED to an infection!  LED LED LED.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Just read this on a blog.

The Worse Case Scenario


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Just read this on a blog.
> 
> The Worse Case Scenario


That's the worst thing I've ever seen! 

I don't know if it counts, but I was reading on a blog the other day a description of the coins minted for the reign of King Edward V. It said the coin had the Archangel Saint Michael on it. Really annoying. The Archangels didn't need sainting.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Doglover said:


> That's the worst thing I've ever seen!


And even worse - it was part of a teaching course!


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Just read this on a blog.
> 
> The Worse Case Scenario


I hate that one.

From a book I'm reading now: "She blushed as the two countesses fixed her with their gaze." Gee, I didn't know countesses could share a single gaze.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jena H said:


> I hate that one.
> 
> From a book I'm reading now: "She blushed as the two countesses fixed her with their gaze." Gee, I didn't know countesses could share a single gaze.


That's a hard one. How would you separate the two gazes? 'the two countesses stared at her' I suppose might work, but it still sounds clumsy.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Doglover said:


> That's a hard one. How would you separate the two gazes? 'the two countesses stared at her' I suppose might work, but it still sounds clumsy.


"The two countesses fixed her with their gazes" would be correct. But yeah, it does sound clunky. Same with "Each of the countesses fixed her with a telling gaze." I think saying that they "stared at her" is fine. Or glared.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Jena H said:


> I hate that one.
> 
> From a book I'm reading now: "She blushed as the two countesses fixed her with their gaze." Gee, I didn't know countesses could share a single gaze.


Maybe they're like the Graeae, sharing a single eye between them.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Jena H said:


> I hate that one.
> 
> From a book I'm reading now: "She blushed as the two countesses fixed her with their gaze." Gee, I didn't know countesses could share a single gaze.


She blushed under the gaze of the two countesses.

She blushed under the gaze of the countess. And then she noticed a second countess gazing at her, and her blushed deepened. She was beetroot red.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

From a recent novel:

"The engine ceased up."

I assume in response to a seize and desist order.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Does anyone else feel obliged to correct grammar and spelling before 'forwarding' something in an email? If mistakes are in some sort of block that can't be edited I am always loath to forward it  .


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## Lyndawrites (Aug 7, 2011)

The British system of knights and peers of the realm is a nightmare to navigate, even to some Brits (self included) who might be expected to know better. Knowing how to address, and refer to, Life Peers, Hereditary Peers and the nobility is a minefield.

However, a "Sir" should never, EVER, be referred to by his surname. Unless he's also a "Lord", and then he can be. 

Let's say that John Doe is knighted for services to the Arts. In which case, as a life peer, he is Sir John (or Sir John Doe) - NOT Sir Doe. If he is married, his wife remains a lowly Mrs Jane Doe or Mrs John Doe. 
If John Doe is a knight AND a lord, then he is Sir John, Lord Doe and any wife is Lady Jane Doe. Together they are Sir John and Lady Doe.

I've just read a book where a character was constantly referred to as Sir Surname - it grated like fingernails down a blackboard. There was even an instance of Sir and Lady Surname. NO! Just no.

_Debrett's Peerage and Baronetage_ is usually cited as the foremost reference work, but there is also _Burke's Peerage_ amongst others.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

I try to get over pet peeves because, well, they're petty, but the increasingly common convention of calling centuries by hundreds irritates me to no end. It's the nineteenth century, not the eighteen-hundreds/1800s. The eighteen-hundreds/1800s is the first decade of the nineteenth century--the decade from 1800 to the end of 1809--not the whole of the century, just as the eighteen-fifties/1850s is the decade from 1850 to the end of 1859 and so on. 

Stop it. Just stop it!


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Lynn Is A Pseudonym said:


> No!
> 
> I can never remember which century is which. It's just one of those things I cannot get to stick. At least with the 1800s I have a half decent chance of knowing what the writer meant.
> 
> It might be wrong, but I kind of like it.


Sure you can remember. You know you're living in the twenty-first century, right? And you know the year is 2018, not 2118, right? Then you know the number in the century will always be one larger than the years it covers. You can't get much simpler than that. 

I note that it's like this because we start counting from year 1, not year 0. So the first century is 1 to 100 (not 0 to 99), which is why the centuries are always one number higher. Of course, this means eighteen-hundreds/1800s is misleading in another way. The first decade of the nineteenth century is technically 1801 to 1810 because the century rolls over on the last day of the first year.

The doubly annoying thing about all this is that the same book that talks about the 1700s and the 1800s will not use 1900s, except to refer to the first decade. So you end up reading that 1800s were followed by the twentieth century--as if that's not more confusing to the reader!


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

WHDean said:


> I try to get over pet peeves because, well, they're petty, but the increasingly common convention of calling centuries by hundreds irritates me to no end. It's the nineteenth century, not the eighteen-hundreds/1800s. The eighteen-hundreds/1800s is the first decade of the nineteenth century--the decade from 1800 to the end of 1809--not the whole of the century, just as the eighteen-fifties/1850s is the decade from 1850 to the end of 1859 and so on.
> 
> Stop it. Just stop it!


The century thing doesn't bother me. (To Lynn Is a Pseudonym: I mentally translate the century by lopping 100 years off, so the 20th century deals with the "1900s" (sorry WHDean!), the 19th century deals with the 1800s, etc.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Lyndawrites said:


> The British system of knights and peers of the realm is a nightmare to navigate, even to some Brits (self included) who might be expected to know better. Knowing how to address, and refer to, Life Peers, Hereditary Peers and the nobility is a minefield.
> 
> However, a "Sir" should never, EVER, be referred to by his surname. Unless he's also a "Lord", and then he can be.
> 
> ...


As a Yank, I admit I'm not 100% knowledgeable on how to address the whole knights/peers/nobility thing. Most of what I know I've learned from reading.  And I have to admit that my guide for this has otherwise been the almighty Miss Manners. Reading her books is a hoot.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

WHDean said:


> Sure you can remember. You know you're living in the twenty-first century, right? And you know the year is 2018, not 2118, right? Then you know the number in the century will always be one larger than the years it covers. You can't get much simpler than that.
> 
> I note that it's like this because we start counting from year 1, not year 0. So the first century is 1 to 100 (not 0 to 99), which is why the centuries are always one number higher. Of course, this means eighteen-hundreds/1800s is misleading in another way. The first decade of the nineteenth century is technically 1801 to 1810 because the century rolls over on the last day of the first year.
> 
> The doubly annoying thing about all this is that the same book that talks about the 1700s and the 1800s will not use 1900s, except to refer to the first decade. So you end up reading that 1800s were followed by the twentieth century--as if that's not more confusing to the reader!


I don't have a problem with the centuries, but I have a similar problem with the time. Is midnight on Tuesday on Tuesday or Wednesday and is it am or pm? Same with midday; is it am or pm? I avoid both times like the plague.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Doglover said:


> I don't have a problem with the centuries, but I have a similar problem with the time. Is midnight on Tuesday on Tuesday or Wednesday and is it am or pm? Same with midday; is it am or pm? I avoid both times like the plague.


It's 12 midnight or 12 noon.

I would say it would be 12 midnight on Tuesday, because it's not quite Wednesday  .


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> It's 12 midnight or 12 noon.
> 
> I would say it would be 12 midnight on Tuesday, because it's not quite Wednesday  .


Jan, my dear, you are, like me, taking the coward's way out!


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Doglover said:


> I don't have a problem with the centuries, but I have a similar problem with the time. Is midnight on Tuesday on Tuesday or Wednesday and is it am or pm? Same with midday; is it am or pm? I avoid both times like the plague.


As far as I know, midnight is 12am, noon is 12pm. Because anytime after 11:59pm is already am: 12:05am, 12:40am, etc.

But I think it comes up so infrequently because when it comes to the exact time of 12:00, people usually just say either midnight or noon, and skip the hour reference.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jena H said:


> As far as I know, midnight is 12am, noon is 12pm. Because anytime after 11:59pm is already am: 12:05am, 12:40am, etc.
> 
> But I think it comes up so infrequently because when it comes to the exact time of 12:00, people usually just say either midnight or noon, and skip the hour reference.


But, if it were am, it wouldn't be 12, would it? 12 is after 11. After 12, I can understand, but not 12 itself. If I have an appointment at 12 midday, it is texted to me as 12 am or pm. Very confusing.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Doglover said:


> But, if it were am, it wouldn't be 12, would it? 12 is after 11. After 12, I can understand, but not 12 itself. If I have an appointment at 12 midday, it is texted to me as 12 am or pm. Very confusing.


Jena is correct. But when I'm writing, it's far less confusing to use midnight and noon. Often the coward's way out is the smartest one.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Ah, the good old slice of time problem. How can noon be 12 pm when _pm_ is a Latin abbreviation for a word that means "afternoon"? Same for am and midnight. It makes no sense, people!

Fortunately, all the good style guides have a simple solution: Don't use either the number 12 or pm or am with noon or midnight. So "Meet me here at midnight" not "Meet me here at 12 midnight." "He walked in just before noon" not "He walked in just before 12 noon." This solution works for the simple reason that there is only one noon and one midnight per day, and the number 12 adds nothing that the words don't already contain.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

WHDean said:


> Ah, the good old slice of time problem. How can noon be 12 pm when _pm_ is a Latin abbreviation for a word that means "afternoon"? Same for am and midnight. It makes no sense, people!
> 
> Fortunately, all the good style guides have a simple solution: Don't use either the number 12 or pm or am with noon or midnight. So "Meet me here at midnight" not "Meet me here at 12 midnight." "He walked in just before noon" not "He walked in just before 12 noon." This solution works for the simple reason that there is only one noon and one midnight per day, and the number 12 adds nothing that the words don't already contain.


Good points


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Jeff Tanyard said:


> Think of it in physics terms. Midnight and noon are singularities where the morning/evening curves break down into asymptotes. Mathematically, neither midnight nor noon should considered either a.m. or p.m.
> 
> However...
> 
> Heisenberg comes into play here. By looking at the clock, we are observing the rate of time, which means we can never tell time with absolute accuracy. There is always a margin of error. And by the time we account for that error when observing noon or midnight, the flow of time has necessarily already drifted into the a.m. or p.m. realm. Therefore, midnight is part of a.m. and noon is part of p.m., because quantum mechanics.


[Cue Rod Serling voice]

_Midnight. Noon. These words roll off our tongues every day. But when does midnight begin? When does noon end? When a clock strikes 12, one or the other is there. And yet neither is there, disappearing as fast as it came. These were questions Jeff Tanyard asked. And he found the answers&#8230;in the Twilight Zone. 
_


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

On a teaching blog.

_Then tye it into what your saying._ 

Don't these people have spell check, or editors?


----------



## Valerie A. (Dec 31, 2016)

Lynn Is A Pseudonym said:


> I thought we were in the twenty-second.
> 
> Maybe I'm a time traveler. I like that idea better than being wrong.


No, I'm afraid it is the twenty-first. But there's nothing wrong with the idea or practice of being wrong. It's become second nature to me.


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## 10105 (Feb 16, 2010)

I found this in a review:

"As a book I think the writing was awful."

...and this in a post here:

"After reading the Look Inside you're a competent writer."

Amusing because both comments reflect on the author's writing.


----------



## UnicornEmily (Jul 2, 2011)

There's a difference between "any more" and "anymore."  Also "any way" and "anyway."  And what is with this word "anyways"?  Get rid of it!  Out!  Out!


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

UnicornEmily said:


> There's a difference between "any more" and "anymore." Also "any way" and "anyway." And what is with this word "anyways"? Get rid of it! Out! Out!


Yeah, "anyways" has always grated on me, too.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Al Stevens said:


> "As a book I think the writing was awful."


Well, if you're a book, you ought to know.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Becca Mills said:


> Well, if you're a book, you ought to know.


Good one


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

On a newspaper blog  

A course of death is yet to be revealed.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> On a newspaper blog
> 
> A course of death is yet to be revealed.


I prefer a course of roast beef, medium-rare.

But seriously, in what context was that sentence written? I can't figure out what the writer was trying to say, since it makes absolutely no sense.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Jena H said:


> I prefer a course of roast beef, medium-rare.
> 
> But seriously, in what context was that sentence written? I can't figure out what the writer was trying to say, since it makes absolutely no sense.


It was a newspaper story about a body being found. It ended with, or should have ended with "A _cause_ of death is yet to be revealed." I don't know if the cause of death had been determined, but not yet revealed.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> It was a newspaper story about a body being found. It ended with, or should have ended with "A _cause_ of death is yet to be revealed." I don't know if the cause of death had been determined, but not yet revealed.


LOL, that's quite a boo-boo. Not a simple typo or letter transposition, but a whole different word.


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## eroticatorium (May 6, 2016)

Doglover said:


> That's the worst thing I've ever seen!
> 
> I don't know if it counts, but I was reading on a blog the other day a description of the coins minted for the reign of King Edward V. It said the coin had the Archangel Saint Michael on it. Really annoying. The Archangels didn't need sainting.


While it does seem superfluous and he was never actually canonized, he is called "Saint Michael" by the Catholic Church (and apparently some other churches according to Wikipedia).


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

eroticatorium said:


> While it does seem superfluous and he was never actually canonized, he is called "Saint Michael" by the Catholic Church (and apparently some other churches according to Wikipedia).


Wikipedia? Oh well it must be right then. They probably got it from the same blog.

The same blog declared that the princes (Edward V and his brother) were imprisoned in a dungeon. They weren't; they were first housed in the royal apartment of the Tower, which is normal for a king or queen about to be crowned and later moved to the middle tower.


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## CaraS. (Jul 18, 2014)

Recently read a romance/thriller with almost every other character "snorting"...by middle of book, was ready to toss it against the wall. And let me say, this was _not _an indie-author.

He snorted.

She snorted.

They all snorted.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

eroticatorium said:


> While it does seem superfluous and he was never actually canonized, he is called "Saint Michael" by the Catholic Church (and apparently some other churches according to Wikipedia).


Could it be due to his underwear? 
https://www.cafepress.com/+st-michael+underwear-panties


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## Gone 9/21/18 (Dec 11, 2008)

One of my pet peeves is the recent tendency to abandon irregular past tense on verbs and slap an "ed" ending on everything. Thus, the sun shined. Yesterday I came across something even better. It's in a book put out by a small press, and the author actually thanked his wonderful editor in an Author's Note. In this one the sun "shown." So did the moon. It wasn't a one-time missed error because it was consistently used throughout in probably half a dozen places, although by the end it seemed like a hundred.

As to the constant snorting - I started a cozy mystery series not long ago that had the same thing, only with laughing. No one ever said a word in the thing without laughing. If anyone ever needs a quick way to make all their characters seem like shallow idiots, here it is.


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## Rose Andrews (Jun 1, 2017)

CaraS. said:


> Recently read a romance/thriller with almost every other character "snorting"...by middle of book, was ready to toss it against the wall. And let me say, this was _not _an indie-author.
> 
> He snorted.
> 
> ...


I read a pirate romance a while back where everyone snarled. Whole lot of snarling going on.


----------



## 10105 (Feb 16, 2010)

"Copious." How often do you see it (or use it) without "notes" as the next word? How often do you see a different adjective rather than "copious" used to describe lots of notes being taken by someone? This is similar to "voracious reader" that I whined about earlier.

I'm waiting for, "He was a voracious reader of her copious notes."


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Al Stevens said:


> "Copious." How often do you see it (or use it) without "notes" as the next word? How often do you see a different adjective rather than "copious" used to describe lots of notes being taken by someone? This is similar to "voracious reader" that I whined about earlier.
> 
> I'm waiting for, "He was a voracious reader of her copious notes."


Just like the word _inclement._ Seems the only thing that is EVER inclement is weather.

In a similar-but-not-quite vein (or in the spirit of this thread, perhaps I should say vain? or vane?  )... anyway, one day I'd love to read or hear about an ex-employee who was gruntled.


----------



## Valerie A. (Dec 31, 2016)

Al Stevens said:


> "Copious." How often do you see it (or use it) without "notes" as the next word? How often do you see a different adjective rather than "copious" used to describe lots of notes being taken by someone? This is similar to "voracious reader" that I whined about earlier.
> 
> I'm waiting for, "He was a voracious reader of her copious notes."


I share your sentiments completely. However, I have to admit to an unfair advantage, or perhaps an unfair access to choices. As a veterinarian I encounter "copious" paired with a variety of things far less agreeable and more graphic than notes.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

CaraS. said:


> Recently read a romance/thriller with almost every other character "snorting"...by middle of book, was ready to toss it against the wall. And let me say, this was _not _an indie-author.
> 
> He snorted.
> 
> ...


Sounds a bit wet to me!


----------



## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Valerie A. said:


> I share your sentiments completely. However, I have to admit to an unfair advantage, or perhaps an unfair access to choices. As a veterinarian I encounter "copious" paired with a variety of things far less agreeable and more graphic than notes.


True. I know I've heard _copious_ being referred to in terms of blood loss in one situation or another.

(I prefer not to think about other instances of the use of copious.  )


----------



## liamashe (Nov 6, 2016)

"Every day" vs "everyday" always upsets me. I've been an ad copywriter for years, and I am starting to see this one creep into professional ad work. I'm not sure when the rules of professional writing began to blur.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Doglover said:


> Sounds a bit wet to me!


----------



## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

From a Newsweek article on the net today: "For whatever reason, it has struck a cord."

So, somebody hit a rope instead of a chord. For whatever reason.


----------



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

I recently read this cinema review in the Spectator. 

"As a general rule, I would not wish to spend nearly three hours in a mini-van with young people who turn up the music real loud."

My British schooling wants to change this to 'really loud'. However, 'real' does seem to be in common use in the US. It was real good - we had a real good time etc. Is 'real' instead of 'really' acceptable in the US?


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Bluebonnet said:


> From a Newsweek article on the net today: "For whatever reason, it has struck a cord."
> 
> So, somebody hit a rope instead of a chord. For whatever reason.


I think we should begin publishing a collection of these


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I recently read this cinema review in the Spectator.
> 
> "As a general rule, I would not wish to spend nearly three hours in a mini-van with young people who turn up the music real loud."
> 
> My British schooling wants to change this to 'really loud'. However, 'real' does seem to be in common use in the US. It was real good - we had a real good time etc. Is 'real' instead of 'really' acceptable in the US?


I think it is, but isn't the Spectator a British publication?


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Doglover said:


> I think it is, but isn't the Spectator a British publication?


Yes, it is, which is why I was surprised. The journalist who wrote the review also seems to be British, but I thought she might have been from the US.


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Yes, it is, which is why I was surprised. The journalist who wrote the review also seems to be British, but I thought she might have been from the US.


I think sometimes these writers spend a lot of time in the US, then come back not remembering the difference.


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> I recently read this cinema review in the Spectator.
> 
> "As a general rule, I would not wish to spend nearly three hours in a mini-van with young people who turn up the music real loud."
> 
> My British schooling wants to change this to 'really loud'. However, 'real' does seem to be in common use in the US. It was real good - we had a real good time etc. Is 'real' instead of 'really' acceptable in the US?


Even in the US, while "real loud" might be used in the vernacular (casual conversation), I don't think any reputable publication would approve the sentence you read. It sounds very amateurish.


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## anotherpage (Apr 4, 2012)

I write whatever the hell i want. The grammar nazi's can suck my.....


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

thevoiceofone said:


> I write whatever the hell i want. The grammar nazi's can suck my.....


Just as well.


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## Bluebonnet (Dec 15, 2013)

Jena H said:


> Even in the US, while "real loud" might be used in the vernacular (casual conversation), I don't think any reputable publication would approve the sentence you read. It sounds very amateurish.


Yes. I use "real" in conversation all the time, but I use "really" in writing.

You can get around the problem by using other words, such as "very" loud or "extremely" loud.


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## 10105 (Feb 16, 2010)

Bluebonnet said:


> You can get around the problem by using other words, such as "very" loud or "extremely" loud.


Or "loud."


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

(copied from another site )


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## Doglover (Sep 19, 2013)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> (copied from another site )


What is that? The shape?


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## Jena H (Oct 2, 2011)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> (copied from another site )


Someone's been messing around with the software spelling.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Just caught these in my draft  

Pubic instead of public.
Suing instead of using.

Automatic spell correction has a lot to answer for


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