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Never Let it be Said That Your Anal-Retentive Attention to Detail Never Yielded Positive Results
November 15, 2003, 10:15 p.m. How is your anger and rage different; the same? Okay, for a start, that should be “how are your anger and rage different;”. That kind of grammar cruelty just makes me so angry! I mean, you can tell as you read it that there’s just something intrinsically wrong with it. Also, that should probably be “How are they the same?”. I don’t think I’m being nitpicky, I’m just asking for some clarity. Without clarity, how on earth will we understand each other? Some people scoff at demands for correct spelling and grammar, but honestly, have you ever tried to read something from a time when there wasn’t a standard form of spelling and grammar? It’s bloody difficult! Take a look at this excerpt from Sir Launfal, a medieval text:
For hete her clothes down sche dede It’s bit naughty, I thought it might entice you to actually have a crack at translating it. Yes, translating it – cause that’s what you have to do when things aren’t spelt properly! Now look, I’ve made a few mistakes in my time, no doubt about that (I wrote a shocker of a sentence for an essay a little while back – damn sleep deprivation), but I always try to read over and edit anything I’m putting up for public viewing (obviously that didn’t happen with my essay though – oops!). Including this diary, which, if I spot a mistake, I will go back and edit. Unfortunately, such a skill seems to be missing from a lot of people who write websites and online diaries. It seems amazing to me, that there can be typos on people’s sites, on pages they even update frequently, and they don’t go back and fix it. Why? Why people? What is it about the internet that makes people think they can put up any old badly-typed, poorly spelled, apostrophe abuse riddled crap, and no one will care?! I care! It bothers me! I twitch, I cringe, I despair and rage when I see “you’re” when they mean “your”, “definately” when they mean “definitely” and “he brung the off the line, was rain told,” when they mean something entirely more coherent. You probably all think I’m completely crazy, getting worked up over something really not that important. But who among you readily understood that quote from Sir Launfal? There’s only one antiquated word in it! The rest is just misspelled and kind of ungrammatical. Imagine if all writing, everywhere, was like that. Horrifying, isn’t it? So I will continue to fight my battles against bad spelling. I will continue to criticise, I will continue to improve, to suggest, to critique. I’m also available to correct manuscripts : ) By the way, gerdylstede means “waist”.
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