OT: Pet Peeve

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rmack350 wrote on 2/21/2006, 10:12 AM
It really irks me that it's only a week! Why not all year!

Franglaise!? Yes I suppose so in your neck of the woods. The San Francisco Unified School District can barely keep the french programs going. Spanish and Cantonese and Mandarin are the big three. Cantonese because the parents speak it and they're really pushy.

It's kind of like offering Cajun as a language.

R
busterkeaton wrote on 2/21/2006, 10:16 AM
My Wife loves that sort of thing. She saw a sign recently that had two mispellings.

She also sent me this which is pretty funny.


THE ELEMENTS OF SPAM.

You can find more Elements of Spam here, but be forewarned the parodies of porno spam have bad language.

corug7 wrote on 2/21/2006, 10:20 AM
"And what about the guys that can't spell "colour"..."

In the sixth grade, I had just finished reading "King Arthur" a few days before a 20 question spelling test covering, among other words, "color," "valor," and "honor."

Hoping for some extra credit, I wrote down the following...

color (or colour)
valor (or valour)
honor (or honour)

I scored a 17 out of 20.
Dan Sherman wrote on 2/21/2006, 10:24 AM
A few years back Robert McNeil co-authored a book entitled
"The Story of English"
It accompanied a PBS series of the same name.
A revised version of the book is now available.
Facinating stuff!
Dan Sherman wrote on 2/21/2006, 10:31 AM
Pretty funny,
Don't know the author

Have you ever wondered why foreigners have trouble with the English Language?

Let's face it
English is a stupid language.
There is no egg in the eggplant
No ham in the hamburger
And neither pine nor apple in the pineapple.
English muffins were not invented in England
French fries were not invented in France.

We sometimes take English for granted
But if we examine its paradoxes we find that
Quicksand takes you down slowly
Boxing rings are square
And a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

If writers write, how come fingers don't fing.
If the plural of tooth is teeth
Shouldn't the plural of phone booth be phone beeth
If the teacher taught,
Why didn't the preacher praught.

If a vegetarian eats vegetables
What the heck does a humanitarian eat!?
Why do people recite at a play
Yet play at a recital?
Park on driveways and
Drive on parkways

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy
Of a language where a house can burn up as
It burns down
And in which you fill in a form
By filling it out
And a bell is only heard once it goes!

English was invented by people, not computers
And it reflects the creativity of the human race
(Which of course isn't a race at all)

That is why
When the stars are out they are visible
But when the lights are out they are invisible
And why it is that when I wind up my watch
It starts
But when I wind up this observation,
It ends.
craftech wrote on 2/21/2006, 10:37 AM
Hoping for some extra credit, I wrote down the following...

color (or colour)
valor (or valour)
honor (or honour)

I scored a 17 out of 20.
=============
Also :

analyze (analyse )
criticize (criticise )
memorize (memorise )
analog (analogue)
catalog (catalogue )
argument (arguement )
check (cheque )
defense (defence )
learned (learnt )
fit (fitted )
strove (strived )

I rather like the British versions me-self.

John
Spot|DSE wrote on 2/21/2006, 10:42 AM
Tell your friend to try Dine'. (Navaho)
Many linguists are of the opinion it's the hardest language to learn, and still doesn't have an 'official' written format. It's all phonetic.
Doesn't have any swear words tho, so that makes vernacular difficult sometimes.
B.Verlik wrote on 2/21/2006, 10:57 AM
Nobody has complained about people calling a period, DOT.
Jay Gladwell wrote on 2/21/2006, 10:57 AM

Wow, I'm pleasantly surprised.

I certainly appreciate everyone taking it in the spirit it was intended. Too, I'm happy to see everyone is having so much fun with it.

'Panda... Large black and white mammal native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves.'

LOL -- Great one, Grazie!

John, or anyone, who was it that said Great Britian and the United States are two countries separated by a common language?


dand9959 wrote on 2/21/2006, 11:07 AM

Linguistics lecturer: English is such a poorly structured language that two negatives in a sentence make it a positive, but two positives don't make it a negative.

Skeptical audience member: Yeah, yeah.
busterkeaton wrote on 2/21/2006, 11:19 AM
Took, me a second to get the yeah, yeah.

However, since this is nitpicking thread, two positives should be a positive. Also a Negative times a Negative is a Positive.
rs170a wrote on 2/21/2006, 11:49 AM
I rather like the British versions me-self.

As a Canadian, I agree :-)
BTW, there's also:

neighbour (neighbor)
flavour (flavor)
licence (license)
And the list goes on.

Mike
rs170a wrote on 2/21/2006, 11:51 AM
...which word in the English language has 5 letters but is pronounced exactly the same if you remove four of its letters?

Come on Alan. Stop teasing (tortuing??) us. What is it?

Mike
Former user wrote on 2/21/2006, 11:56 AM
You only use the apostrophe if you use periods.

http://www.writersblock.ca/tips/monthtip/tipmar96.htm
daryl wrote on 2/21/2006, 12:07 PM
OK, gotta mention this one, been bugging me for years:

Television reports who say "AN historical event". "AN" is used when the next word is a vowel or vowel sound, nobody would say "An history book", NO, it is "A history book", "hiss" is not a vowel or vowel sound.
I do know the answer to this one, even though I don't like it. I do like the broadcasters who do say "a historical", you'll hear it both ways on the air.

English is a very weird language.
jkrepner wrote on 2/21/2006, 12:17 PM
I agree with everyone's assessment that the English language is a mess, but allow me to play devil's advocate for a second. Couldn't one say that the inconsistencies and double meanings of the English language speak to the fact that the human mind is too complex for words (well, not every human mind I guess) and the English language is just a product of this? Ain't some of the most important literary works of our time in English?


johnmeyer wrote on 2/21/2006, 12:18 PM
Answers to the original question, as well as many of those posted subsequently, can be found in the "bible" for American English (if that's not an oxymoron) usage, namely The Chicago Manual of Style. Sections 6.14 through 6.21 contain rules for plurals and possessives.

It turns out that you can correctly use the apostrophe to create plurals in several circumstances, which I am sure is what leads to the confusion. However, Kelly's question (if anyone can remember back that far) in the second post about CDs vs. CD's is answered thusly:

"So far as it can be done without confusion, single or multiple letters, hyphenated coinages, and numbers used as nouns (whether spelled out or in numerals) form the plural by adding s alone."

It then goes on to say:

"Abbreviations having more than one period, such as M.D. and Ph.D., often form their plurals by the addition of an apostrophe and an s."
PossibilityX wrote on 2/21/2006, 12:52 PM
To, too, two.

::::The people over at "OT: Special Effects Quote of the Day" say you need learing that language evolves to.::::

No disrespect, MH Stevens, but I think you mean "too." But I bet you stuck that in there as a joke, right? I knew it.

And how about the matter of strange pronunciations? When I first moved to Oklahoma, I was finishing a job and a guy asked me:

"How much do you like?"
ME: How much do I like what?
GUY: No, how much more you got to go?
ME: Got to go?
GUY: How much do you LIKE finishin' the job?
ME: I like finishing my jobs, I guess...why do you ask?

I finally figured out the guy was trying to say LACK. How much do you LACK? Which still isn't a proper construction, but I'm 90% Jethro Bodine myself, so what the hell.

---John
AlanC wrote on 2/21/2006, 12:58 PM
rs170a

Marquat got it earlier. It's "Q" :~)
rs170a wrote on 2/21/2006, 1:42 PM
It's "Q" :~)


Thanks Alan. That smack you hear is me hitting the side of my head :-)

Mike
corug7 wrote on 2/21/2006, 1:51 PM
Television reports who say "AN historical event". "AN" is used when the next word is a vowel or vowel sound...

It helps if you add a little Cockney to it.
"An 'istorical event."
plasmavideo wrote on 2/21/2006, 1:52 PM
QUOTE: I do know the answer to this one, even though I don't like it. I do like the broadcasters who do say "a historical", you'll hear it both ways on the air.

Broadcasters - don't get me started on stinkin' broadcasters!

Also, pet peeve - deliberate misspellings for attention

"Kuntry Kooking" - -- - arrgghh!
wolfbass wrote on 2/21/2006, 2:02 PM
CD's and DVD's Vs. CDs and DVDs.

If the apostrophe was being used to replace missing letters, then it would be:

C'D's and D'V'D's wouldn't it? :)

How about C.D.s and D.V.D.s? :)

I'll stick with CDs and DVDs I think.

Entertaining thread.
winrockpost wrote on 2/21/2006, 2:10 PM
An before H

From Dr. Grammer

The theory behind using an in such a context, however, is that the h- is very weak when the accent is on the second rather than the first syllable (giving rise, by analogy, to an habitual offender, an humanitarian, an hallucinatory image, and an harassed schoolteacher). Thus no authority countenances an history[emphasis added], though a few older ones prefer an historian and an historical.
Today, however, an hypothesis and an historical are likely to strike readers and listeners as affectations. As Mark Twain once wrote, referring to humble, heroic, and historical: 'Correct writers of the American language do not put an before those words' (The Stolen White Elephant,1882). Anyone who sounds the h- in such words should avoid pretense and use a (Garner 1).