Also Known As

I'm really a bit of a purist when it comes to quotation marks.  I prefer for them to be used only for direct quotations.  I realize that that hope is not based entirely in reality, however.

Because quotation marks are also often used to indicate that something is not authentic or an imperfect substitute or something other than what it is called, misuse of quotation marks, particularly by those who use them as a misguided way to draw attention to or put emphasis on a word or group of words, can be quite hilarious.

So they might be Black Angus steaks, but they darned sure are not certified.  The word certified, by the way, was in quotation marks everywhere it occurred in the menu.  If you're going to use them incorrectly, I suppose you might as well use them consistently incorrectly, eh?

And then there's this high note of quotation mark misusage hilarity:

Actually, it's far more sad than hilarious.

I'm not sure what the EXes are all about, and I'm not going to get into a discussion about the use of till instead of until.  That's a gripe for another day.  There's just so much wrong with almost everything in that sign, it's hard to me to see straight at this point.  My eyes are burning.  Look away!

If your retinas are not aflame from the atrocity above, you may want to check out The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks.  Hilarious stuff over there.  Better, even, than the examples above.

Not to be ignored

Colons, that is.

Colons have a number of uses, but in warnings or notices, they separate the introductory word from the information the notice provides.  Like this:

Warning: Failure to use colons may result in embarassment.

For example: 

Those stainless steel pans certainly are important. 

Now I will say that while the colon would make this more clear (noting that there is something important about the stainless steel pans), generally what follows the colon in cases of introduction like this should be clearly important.  An even better solution would be a reworded headline such as Important Stainless Steel Pan Information.

Then there's this one:

How many ladder emergencies have you had recently?  A colon after LADDER would clear this right up.

The sign writer could also have reworded this one to LADDER FOR EMERGENCY USE ONLY, but the colon is a whole lot shorter and would have required no further repositioning of words.

Not a good sign

It looks like this proofreading service could use a proofreading service.

I know some people are thinking that the semicolon should be a colon, but it shouldn't.  It just simply should not be there.  This is a basic punctuation error, and what makes it hilarious is that you would think a copy editing company would actually use their copy editors for their online advertisements. 

Or maybe they were just hoping that their potential clients are so uninformed in the ways of grammar that they wouldn't notice.  Either way it's sad.

Or funny.  You choose.

It's a special day! Every day!

I suppose, technically, this photo doesn't have a truly grammatical error in it.  But I'm of the opinion that if you are going to have a day to celebrate something, it should be one day, and not a whole month:

I'm really glad that McDonald's has decided to honor their employees with a day of appreciation.  It would just be nice if we knew when they are doing that. 

"National People Day" (the lamest employee appreciation day name I've ever heard, by the way) would indicate that there is one day to celebrate the hard-working crew at MickeyD's.  September, however, is a month, not a day.  Nowhere in the fine print is there a single day outlined. 

So why isn't it National People Month?  Or why didn't they choose a single day?  And--possibly most importantly--what are they doing to recognize the crew?  Because I wouldn't feel very honored by a strangely ambiguous sign placed on tables that customers won't even see until after I've placed their orders.

I'm not saying; I'm just saying.

Mumms the word?

When did doubling the end consonant before adding an s become acceptable?

There is a rule for doubling the vowel at the end of a word when adding an ending.  It seems like a complicated rule (double the final consonant if it is a single consonant preceded by a single vowel and the ending you're adding begins in a vowel), and if you don't know it or remember it intuitively from years of spelling in elementary school, using a spell-checking program is a good idea for you.

It seems to me that Meijer sign makers would have a spell checker at their disposal.  Especially since this sign was obviously typed on some sort of computer.

Martha should be outraged!

Outraged that two errors would appear in advertisements in her fine, fine publication, Martha Stewart Living.  Typos in publications are relatively common; I can usually find one or two in any publication.  Living is an exception, though.  I'm hard-pressed to find a typo or grammatical error in a whole year of issues.  I like to think that it's because Martha is so detail oriented.

Apparently, though, if I want errors in Martha's publication, I need to look in the less expensive advertising in the very back.

First up, baths for sale:

Yes, folks, for just under ten bucks, you can purchase a bath from a magazine ad.  Martha herself takes these ten-dollar baths, and she loves them.  She recommends the FREE* monogramming, too.  Only Martha could find a way to monogram an action such as bathing.

I'm fairly certain that these ads are priced based on dimensions, not word count, and I don't know about you, but I see quite a bit of empty space in this ad for one additional word of clarification.

And what's up with all the asterisks?  Really?  Is the deal so shady that everything needs legal fine print?

Disturbed by the lack of proofreading or copywriting skill, I turned the page to find this beauty (and please excuse the fuzzy pictures; I'm a grammarian, not a photographer):

I know you don't see a problem with this ad; the photo is too out of focus to read it.  The issue is in the second paragraph, and it's one that most people would overlook, anyhow:

That last line ends with, "for those that just love to cook."

Apparently GelPro mats are designed for non-humans that love to cook.  If they were talking about people with an affinity for cooking, they surely would have used who instead of that.  And I don't know if you've priced out GelPro mats, but I have (because I do love to cook, and my kitchen floor is tile), and I'm guessing that my dog can't afford one.

She's a lousy cook, anyhow.

Spelling Lessons from Lorena Bobbitt

The sign was supposed to read, "Fresh Cut Peonies."

Alternate title:

     "Who Knew They Were So Cheap?"

    

This beauty was a viral internet sensation a few years back (note the date on the photo), but it's a good example of why it's important to have someone take a look at your writing before making it public.  It's also a good example of why paying serious attention in spelling class is important.  And recognizing that being a bad speller isn't the end of the world, but it does require that you ask for help now and then.

Remember, folks, even if the poor employee who put up this tragic marquee had had access to spell-check, penis would not have been flagged since it is, in fact, a real word.

For anyone who might be thinking that I'm overlooking another error, I'm not.  The adjective fresh would modify peonies, not cut.  We're not talking about a florist whose manner of cutting flowers is too forward.  And in this case, of course, fresh modifies penis, which would mean the insertion of the adverb freshly  would make the sign even more suggestive--if you can imagine--than it already is.

In addition, fresh is essential to the way the sign is (incorrectly) written. I mean, who would want a stale cut penis?