Spelling.

[Eilan]

Probably because of people like you using it for "naughty" purposes...

I'm sure of it. Can't take me nowhere nohow.

 

[AppleBiter]

I don't know if anyone has posted these, because admittedly, I haven't read through the whole thread, but my NUMBER ONE pet peave of spelling errors has to be when people misuse "your" or "you're."

*If anyone reading this is wondering, "Your" is the possessive form of "you," while "You're" is the cunjuction for "You Are."

Therefore, it is not "Your hot," it's "You're hot." It's not "You're dildo," it's "Your dildo." See the difference?

The other thing that gets under my skin is the all-too-often misplaced apostrophe with the word its.

"Its," believe it or not, even though it does not have an apostrophe, is possessive. Oh yes. Look it up. It's true. The other example I just used, "It's" is a conjuction for "It is."

Therefore, "Its a wild orgy" is incorrect. This should be "It's a wild orgy." On the other hand, "I measured it's length" is incorrect while "I measured its length" is correct.

Also: "Their" is a possessive, meaning "belonging to them." "There" is a word referring to a place. They are not, I repeat NOT interchangeable.

And "Judgment" is spelled just the way I spelled it -- not "Judgement"

Thank you.

That is all. [/rant]

 

[Eilan]

It's not "You're dildo," it's "Your dildo."

Unless, of course, you're wanting to call someone a dildo, but I suppose that would be "You're a dildo."

Maybe it's name-calling sans proofreading.

 

[AppleBiter]

Unless, of course, you're wanting to call someone a dildo, but I suppose that would be "You're a dildo."

Precisely.

 

[midwestyankee]

Unless, of course, you're wanting to call someone a dildo, but I suppose that would be "You're a dildo."

Maybe it's name-calling sans proofreading.

Or perhaps it's a case of name calling by a dildo.

 

[bisexplicit]

Bear in mind, however, that uniformity (at least some modicum of predictability and commonality of usage) are absolute essentials without which civilization could not exist.

True. However, uniformity is not something that is lacking, currently...Suppressing individual cultures is the norm.

 

[shannon_est]

My pet peeve is the use of extasy, no not the drug, the spelling of the word, which was derived from the drug.

How hard is it to use a dictionary?

ec·sta·sy

1. Intense joy or delight.
2. A state of emotion so intense that one is carried beyond rational thought and self-control: an ecstasy of rage.
3. The trance, frenzy, or rapture associated with mystic or prophetic exaltation.

 

[midwestyankee]

True. However, uniformity is not something that is lacking, currently...Suppressing individual cultures is the norm.

I'm not sure that I can accept your take on this. The language changes through mass usage and no single authority can divert the evolution. If individual cultures are not well represented in the language, it's not through some manipulated action led from on high by a powerful majority. Instead, linguistic change tends to be quite Darwinian in that words or phrases or even variant pronunciations make their way into the common language by being found useful to communicate something new or different by large numbers of people. And if you need to see a good example of how i is that an authority is completely powerless to thwart linguistic change, look at the futile efforts of l'Académie Française to fend off the popularization of such words as "le drugstore" from French. No one can control a language so to say that the language exhibits evidence of something being suppressed is, at best, disingenuous.

 

[EJFan]

an oldie but goodie

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.

 

[Munachi]

actually though, lots of people go on about how easy english is as a foreign language... of course, often those are the ones you also often hardly understand due to their strong accents and grammar mistakes...

 

[Guest]

 

[phoenix1224]

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.

Now that's too funny...

 

[SweetErika]

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.

That's great, EJ. I just about died last year when my Korean students started using 'wanna,' 'gotta' and 'ain't' in conversations and throughout their writing. I had to explain that a lot of Americans don't speak English very well at all, and much of the time, ESL students had the upper hand when it came to grammar and spelling.

As a side note, they think going to school in the U.S. is a picnic; in Korea, they go to school and have tutoring sessions from 7a.m. to midnight, six days a week.

 

[Eilan]

2B or N2B, that is the FAQ.

Thanks. Thou hast cleft my heart in twain with this post.

Actually, some students wouldn't go to that much trouble. They'd just get the paper from some online paper mill. There's little typing involved.

Of course, the red flags tend to go up when the header reads: [Insert student's last name 2].

 

[Quoll]

Thanks. Thou hast cleft my heart in twain with this post.

Actually, some students wouldn't go to that much trouble. They'd just get the paper from some online paper mill. There's little typing involved.

Of course, the red flags tend to go up when the header reads: [Insert student's last name 2].

Perhaps you could have marked the paper with "Thou fawning half-faced codpiece!"

 

[Guest]

 

[Eilan]

Didn't mean to break your heart. (Guess they don't call me Scalywag for nothing.) You must be a real Shakespeare fan.

In July, I took a mini-vacation just because of Shakespeare. Yeah, I'm pathetic.

That's hilarious, the "insert student's last name". Hard to believe people are that stupid.

Yeah, people are that stupid. In five years, I failed only one student for plagiarism, and she was dumber than that. Hard to believe, but true.

 

[glynndah]

How do you pronounce "GHOTI"?

GH as in cough
O as in women
TI as in action

FISH

No wonder people are so confused by spelling!

 

[CURIOUS1026]

I found these links to be fun and informative, especially the mispronounced words. It drives me nuts when people mix up idioms/sayings, like "take it with a grain assault" or "for all intensive purposes." Yes, I know they're difficult to hear correctly, but when you stop and think about it, does assaulting grain really make sense?
100 Most Often Misspelled Words
100 Most Misprounounced Words

OMG......the misspelled words link had me laughing out loud (see restaurant and personnel)

 

[Guest]

 

[phoenix1224]

That's great, EJ. I just about died last year when my Korean students started using 'wanna,' 'gotta' and 'ain't' in conversations and throughout their writing. I had to explain that a lot of Americans don't speak English very well at all, and much of the time, ESL students had the upper hand when it came to grammar and spelling.

As a side note, they think going to school in the U.S. is a picnic; in Korea, they go to school and have tutoring sessions from 7a.m. to midnight, six days a week.

Also, they don't get that nice, long summer vacation.

 

[Quoll]

Reasons why the English language is so hard to learn:

1) The bandage was wound around the wound.
2) The farm was used to produce produce.
3) The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
4) We must polish the Polish furniture.
5) He could lead if he would get the lead out.
6) The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
7) Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to
present the present.
8) A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
9) When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
10) I did not object to the object.
11) The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
12) There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.
13) They were too close to the door to close it.
14) The buck does funny things when the does are present.
15) A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.
16) To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
17) The wind was too strong to wind up the sail.
18) After a number of injections my jaw got number.
19) Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.
20) I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
21) How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?

 

[Eilan]

Oh, yeah. It's avatar, not avitar or aviator!

And no matter how you spell it, you still have to have 100 posts before you can have one.

 

[AppleBiter]

Oh, yeah. It's avatar, not avitar or aviator!

And no matter how you spell it, you still have to have 100 posts before you can have one.

*snicker*

 

[Quoll]

Oh, yeah. It's avatar, not avitar or aviator!

And no matter how you spell it, you still have to have 100 posts before you can have one.

Oh shit