Bird is a Word: Grammatical Glitches

Piecemaker · Post by **Piecemaker** » Jun 30th, 2007, 11:25 pm

LOL. Grammar is obviously not a strength of the KSS graduating class--or many others, I fear.
What is also amusing is when cliches or phrases get misquoted. I once had someone tell me about something caused her son to "get his DANDRUFF up!"

amomof2dogs · Post by **amomof2dogs** » Jul 1st, 2007, 8:42 am

Piecemaker wrote:LOL. Grammar is obviously not a strength of the KSS graduating class--or many others, I fear.
What is also amusing is when cliches or phrases get misquoted. I once had someone tell me about something caused her son to "get his DANDRUFF up!"

I love some of the mangled phrases. My daughter complained that her brother was a "doubting Dave." When I asked her if she meant a 'doubting Thomas', she didn't have a clue what I was talking about. Apparently doubting Dave sounds better. ...And this coming from a girl who is a voracious reader and an Honours English student.

edited for spelling

hevvonly · Post by **hevvonly** » Jul 2nd, 2007, 9:38 am

It's funny how idioms and sayings get changed around. I once heard someone say, "A leopard can't change its socks." I think they meant "spots"!

Piecemaker · Post by **Piecemaker** » Jul 2nd, 2007, 6:27 pm

LOL Although I guess a leopard can't change his socks either. How about "A penny saved is...not much!"

LongInt · Post by **LongInt** » Aug 8th, 2007, 11:41 pm

Aside from several already mentioned, one that makes me cringe is the use of the plural "phenomena", when the singular "phenomenon" should be used.

50++ · Post by **50++** » Aug 12th, 2007, 12:41 am

Jo · Post by Jo » Aug 12th, 2007, 7:05 am

'Actually' drives me nuts, I say it far too often. The word is almost always redundant.

I agree, slurred words are bad, 50+, and there are so many examples. The slurred expression that has my family in stitches these days is, "I don't know". Say it naturally, the way you would if you weren't thinking about it. I have heard (and, god forbid, said) it any number of ways, from "I dunno" to a sort of mixed soup of letters, "ahdnnh". If someone says, "ahdnnh", people will understand what it means, that is the scary (and funny) part. I can't recall the last time I've heard someone speak the words in a clear and precise way.

Gordian Knot · Post by **Gordian Knot** » Aug 12th, 2007, 7:18 am

One that I hate and am all to guilty of is "gonna" instead of "going to". I do it frequently and drive myself crazy. I have been trying to be more precise since my son is starting to pick up words at an alarming rate and I don't want him saying "gonna". Sounds ill-educated.

Also, and this is more computer related, I despise the new shorthand versions of words used frequently on forums. Like "R" instead of are, "U" instead of "you". Etc etc. I don't mind it in text messages so much, but on a forum, take the few extra seconds to write out those few extra letters!! (I'm not so much speaking about things like LOL or ROFLMAO, just the ones for specific words. Drives me crazy!)

Jo · Post by Jo » Aug 12th, 2007, 7:36 am

You're right about 'gonna', Gordian. Heather and I spent a weekend trying to eliminate all our bad speaking habits, and had appallingly bad luck with it. Mind you, we had a lot of fun doing it, but boy, did we ever bomb.

'Yes' instead of 'yeah', 'I don't know' instead of 'dunno', 'going to' instead of 'gonna', 'as' instead of 'like', and so on.

The word 'actually' nailed us, we decided that if we said 'actually' a total of four times between us, we would not go out for lunch that day. Within nanoseconds, we had lost our right to lunch, so we adjusted it to four times each, not saying it. That failed as well, so we had to add the baby into the mix, and he, good baby, didn't say it so we were home-free and able to go out for lunch. :lol:

Skali · Post by **Skali** » Aug 12th, 2007, 8:41 am

Along the same lines as "actually," is the GROSS over-usage of "frankly."

Folks drop this in every 4-5 sentences, which makes me think that during the 2-3 sentences in between, they aren't, in fact, being frank. Indeed, perhaps they're being ambiguous, evasive, or shifty. In which case, you can't believe anything they say, even when they do preface it with "frankly."

Jo · Post by Jo » Aug 12th, 2007, 8:43 am

Frankly, I must agree with you, actually. And such sentences are invariably spiced with 'you know'. Actually, I don't go there, you know, because frankly, I find it too much to take." :lol:

BriTer · Post by **BriTer** » Aug 12th, 2007, 8:52 am

Jo wrote::lol: Frankly, I must agree with you, actually. And such sentences are invariably spiced with 'you know'. Actually, I don't go there, you know, because frankly, I find it too much to take."

Well, folks are gonna post like that anyway frankly.

Jo · Post by Jo » Aug 12th, 2007, 9:12 am

BriTer wrote:
Jo wrote::lol: Frankly, I must agree with you, actually. And such sentences are invariably spiced with 'you know'. Actually, I don't go there, you know, because frankly, I find it too much to take."

Well, folks are gonna post like that anyway frankly.

This is true! Mind you, it isn't the written word so much as the spoken word that I'm trying to correct (in myself, not others). I don't mind others doing it so much as I detest hearing myself do it.

Nebula · Post by **Nebula** » Aug 12th, 2007, 5:57 pm

I know several people who not only speak a certain pet peeve of mine but write it as well: 'of' instead of 'have'.

Example: "He should of bought the blue one."

I may be a writer but I'm the first to admit I'm a terrible grammarian at times. I tend to be a dyslexic typist -- meaning I'll get all the right letters typed out for a word but not necessarily in the right order.

My worst trait is punctuation or the overuse of it.

LongInt · Post by **LongInt** » Aug 12th, 2007, 8:54 pm

writerdave wrote:I know several people who not only speak a certain pet peeve of mine but write it as well: 'of' instead of 'have'.

Example: "He should of bought the blue one."

That one bugs me, too, Dave. It got its start with the correctly-used contraction, "should've". Whenever I see people write "should of", I shake my head and wonder how they think that that makes any sense at all.