STYLETHREAD -- LET'S TALK SHOP!

poptart · Coach

Grammar rant

scarlett · Marc Jacobs

He he -- that stuff drives me crazy too. I was in a restaurant recently where they had a sign on the wall with "Special's" listed, and someone had marked out the apostrophe, which is exactly what I would have wanted to do. Your description of colour televisions showing programmes made me laugh!

Metric · Gucci

I know what you mean about people not using words in the right context...

but it took me forever to figure out why you were on about judgement, colour and theatre that's how we spell them.

NCshopper · Hermes

Oh, I loathe when people misuse weary, wary, and leery. They are THREE SEPARATE WORDS PEOPLE! And they mean DIFFERENT THINGS!!! Gaaaaaaaaaaaaah!

My personal pet peeve is the misuse of quotes. Like signs that say:
"Fresh" Seafood
"Hot" dogs
"Tickets" Sold Here!

Kelly · Hermes

Oh my gosh, my secret job is a grammar policewoman. I used to work at a magazine where I got to proofread everything. I wasn't the head copy editor, so I was the first round of proofreading. I couldn't believe how many mistakes that these people, who WRITE FOR A LIVING, were making. Mistakes drive me insane! Whenever I make a mistake on here, it's all I can do from going back and editing every single one of my posts. It's the little stuff, too, that I can't believe people do. Like "Special's." Didn't someone along the line realize what was going on there?

jettie · Kate Spade

Bad grammar is a really big pet peeve of mine too....this sounds really, really bad but part of the reason why I broke up with my ex was his use of bad grammar. It hurts my ears.

Kelly · Hermes

jettie wrote:

Bad grammar is a really big pet peeve of mine too....this sounds really, really bad but part of the reason why I broke up with my ex was his use of bad grammar. It hurts my ears.

LOL it doesn't sound bad. I can't stand it when I hear people on the street, or at work, or at school using horrible grammar. I definitely couldn't willingly subject myself to that for extended periods of time! You're my hero!

kenzie · Chanel

I am also a member of the grammar police. I can't stand bad grammar. When I notice a mistake in my own grammar and/or spelling on this site, I have to go back and edit it so that it's right.

One of my bigger pet peeves is the misuse of your and you're. Your is possessive; you're is a contraction for 'you are'- they are not interchangeable. And yet, the general population refuses to acknowledge that. Same thing goes for its and it's.

As for the spelling of the word theatre--- I use the British spelling when referring to a play or musical, but the American spelling when referring to a movie. I don't think I'm alone in this usage. And I also prefer the word 'grey' spelled the British way, so when I'm not writing something that will be published (as in, just a post on this site), I will use the British spelling. But if it's something that will be published in an article or advertisement, I use the American spelling.

-- Edited by kenzie at 13:15, 2006-08-26

jacL · Coach

I am with all of you. I did a brief stint as a copy editor in college and I still want to edit everything I see. I have even seen mistakes in the Chicago Tribune--it is such a shame.

Ally S · Kate Spade

I'm a nut about grammar as well, nothing drives me crazier then hearing or reading the misuse of the language.

A few personal peeves are then vs. than and saw vs. seen

Not using who/whom correctly and like Poptart said, the misuse of entirely different words mainly "bought" and "brought". I just cringe when I hear that or read it, how dumb can people be?

NCshopper · Hermes

jacL wrote:

I am with all of you. I did a brief stint as a copy editor in college and I still want to edit everything I see. I have even seen mistakes in the Chicago Tribune--it is such a shame.

OMG--I saw a grammar mistake on the NY Times homepage a few weeks ago. It was a classic there/their mistake. At the NY Times! I wanted to print it out to make me feel better about making mistakes, but when I hit "refresh" it had already been changed.

ETA: I had forgotten that I took a picture of this sign at Wendy's once. See if you can spot the mistake. (There's a grammar mistake and a nice little spelling mistake too.)

-- Edited by NCshopper at 17:20, 2006-08-26

MissMee · Kate Spade

Oh, good! It's not just me!!!!! My biggest pet peeve is the apostrophe thing. Especially when it's at a nice business or on a permanent sign that someone paid big bucks for. (Yes, I realize that last sentence was poor grammar w/ it's preposition at the end - so sue me!). Brooks Brothers had a sign at their registers with an apostrophe in the wrong place. Drove me nuts! And one of my daughter's shirts from H&M uses "there" instead of "their."

Another hate of mine is when someone says, "I seen" instead of "I saw." {{{{shudder}}}}}

I was an English major, so I have issues.

kenzie · Chanel

Ally S wrote:

Not using who/whom correctly and like Poptart said, the misuse of entirely different words mainly "bought" and "brought". I just cringe when I hear that or read it, how dumb can people be?

ACK!! I hate this one, too!! You bought something at the store. You brought it home. The two are not the same thing!!!!! And the seen/saw thing drives me batty, too.

poptart · Coach

I feel soooo much better! I am actually a complete slacker about grammar in anything that isn't going to be published (hence the many errors in my posts on ST that I never bother to correct). I have to do it all day at work (I'm an editor) so I just don't care that much when I'm writing for non-professional things. Shameful, I know.

Kenzie, I am totally with you on theater/theatre. I do the same. And I use gray and grey pretty much interchangeably in casual settings, too.

NCShopper: Thanks so much for your patients. I love it when you bring them to Wendy's. Good lord. That is horrible.

kahluamilk · Dooney & Bourke

My my.. Wendy's!!! How obvious is that mistake?!

I also can't stand it when something is itchy and someone tells me to itch it... HUH? You SCRATCH when it's itchy. You don't itch it!

valenciana · Dooney & Bourke

i too am guilty of being a grammar stickler...good lord...last week i read this news article online and in the headline, okay, the little sub-headline, they used the word "ideosyncratic"...hmmm, it doesn't even LOOK right. granted, this is the site of a fairly small, local-y newspaper, but still!

oh, and this is the same paper that totally ruined my perfectly written and edited (when i submitted it) wedding announcement. they felt the need to add random commas such as when they said that i got married "August, 6, 2005" and the like.

and i'm constantly finding errors in my textbooks. god, it bugs me...i cannot believe these books get published with the amount of glaring errors and horrible editing.

halleybird · Hermes

I agree with the above and would like to add:

-I can't stand seeing 5$ instead of $5.
-Their/they're/there. Three different words.
-the word blonde. It's a noun for a woman with blond hair. Blond is an adjective and a noun for a man with blond hair.
-on that note, I hate when people get fiance/fiancee wrong.
-still on that note, yay="good for you!" yea= "yes, I agree." I can't stand to see "Yay or nay."
-periods go inside quotation marks almost all of the time.

you guys will also appreciate this: at school this week, we read a story where a boy mentioned he wanted to be a carpenter. One kid asked what a carpenter was. I asked the class to tell him, and they all responded, "someone who lays carpet!"

Kelly · Hermes

alb · Marc Jacobs

poptart wrote:

NCShopper: Thanks so much for your patients. I love it when you bring them to Wendy's. Good lord. That is horrible.

Sadly, the sign didn't even read "your patients"; it read "thank you for you patients"!! I see "you" misused for "your" all the time, along with "you're" instead of "your."

theotherjess · Chanel

scarlett wrote:

He he -- that stuff drives me crazy too. I was in a restaurant recently where they had a sign on the wall with "Special's" listed, and someone had marked out the apostrophe, which is exactly what I would have wanted to do. Your description of colour televisions showing programmes made me laugh!

I hate that too! I'm not perfect by any means but I hate it when people confuse 's for s (ex. apple's for sale instead of apples for sale). I also saw a store this summer that had a sign that said "Were open". I added an apostrophe for them .

ETA: I'm officially paranoid about my grammar. Ahhhh.

-- Edited by theotherjess at 15:22, 2006-08-27