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English & Linguistics / Re: Trying a little experiment
« on: November 24, 2016, 05:33:52 PM »Is that grey?
It works, I think, whatever color it is.
Looks dark brown on mine..
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Looks dark brown on mine..
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English & Linguistics / Re: Dear Expert
« on: November 17, 2016, 04:28:50 PM »
You two are taking all the fight right out of me.. 
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English & Linguistics / Re: Dear Expert
« on: November 17, 2016, 03:04:11 PM »
Jonathon - help me out here.
The guys (I work in network support area) keep writing documentation that says things like "The batch job errored at this point".
I keep telling them there is no such word as "errored" - you can say "erred" but I'm not sure even then they are using it correctly. Probably better to say "the process encountered an error" or something like that. But CAN you actually use "erred" as the past tense of error in these instances? I see one web site that says you can't say "the program erred" because the program isn't making a mistake. Confused.
The guys (I work in network support area) keep writing documentation that says things like "The batch job errored at this point".
I keep telling them there is no such word as "errored" - you can say "erred" but I'm not sure even then they are using it correctly. Probably better to say "the process encountered an error" or something like that. But CAN you actually use "erred" as the past tense of error in these instances? I see one web site that says you can't say "the program erred" because the program isn't making a mistake. Confused.
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English & Linguistics / Re: Funny English and Linguistics stuff...
« on: September 04, 2016, 06:33:54 PM »Um . . . no.
Now I'm debating whether I should respond.
I keep checking there to see if you responded and educated her; but so far... nothing.
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English & Linguistics / Re: Funny English and Linguistics stuff...
« on: September 04, 2016, 06:28:39 PM »
The WonderMark that Jonathon posted is so confusing, that I am never going to use "Begging the Question" ever again; because I have absolutely no idea now of what is right and wrong. (However, I don't think I really ever use that idiom anyway)
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English & Linguistics / Re: I hate journalistic writing
« on: August 10, 2016, 03:37:01 PM »
This happened in my state.
I agree the headline is unclear. Basically what they have been saying is that there is no STATE inspection of such rides. All rides are inspected by industry inspectors, not state inspectors.
This boy poor did no "stupid stunts", according to the two women in the raft with him (although lots of people, admittedly DO often do stupid things). He was decapitated, most likely by the straps.
That was a dreadful way of writing a headline just to say there is no state regulation -- which is an entirely different thing than saying whether a ride is, or is not, safe.
I agree the headline is unclear. Basically what they have been saying is that there is no STATE inspection of such rides. All rides are inspected by industry inspectors, not state inspectors.
This boy poor did no "stupid stunts", according to the two women in the raft with him (although lots of people, admittedly DO often do stupid things). He was decapitated, most likely by the straps.
That was a dreadful way of writing a headline just to say there is no state regulation -- which is an entirely different thing than saying whether a ride is, or is not, safe.
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English & Linguistics / Re: The spurious etymology of the day
« on: July 20, 2016, 04:52:38 PM »Tante, sometimes your humorous explanations on various things remind me much of the character Cliff Clavin from Cheers
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English & Linguistics / Re: New column-type thingy
« on: July 07, 2016, 05:56:41 PM »
Thanks. I had already found the one from Grammar Girl, but felt it was a bit lacking in clarification - but I guess it says what I need to know.
(was discussing with a local journalist who used 'flush out' instead of 'flesh out' the city council's work on clarifying, expanding and defining the fire department policy)
(was discussing with a local journalist who used 'flush out' instead of 'flesh out' the city council's work on clarifying, expanding and defining the fire department policy)
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English & Linguistics / Re: Dear Expert
« on: July 06, 2016, 06:31:06 PM »I just realized that we had fake infix "languages" that we used when we were kids. I heard several versions - one was called "Oppish" and was created by inserting the syllable "-opp," such as in "OppI'm Soppo hoppappoppy toppoo soppee yoppou!" The others were just a variation on the syllable you inserted. I always thought it was interesting when I was young how it sounded so complicated at first but then once you got the hang of it it came as second nature, both speaking and listening. But now I'm realizing we were just teaching ourselves a grammatical feature that didn't exist in English, but once it was learned, like any other foreign grammatical feature, our brains dealt with it just fine.
By that definition/example -- then isn't 'pig latin' also an infix?
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English & Linguistics / Re: New column-type thingy
« on: July 06, 2016, 06:25:17 PM »
Jon - do you have a column I can refer to that clarifies the use of "flesh out" versus "flush out"?
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English & Linguistics / Re: Dear Expert
« on: March 13, 2016, 01:34:07 PM »Hey, look: even the official AP Twitter account gets it wrong.
- and it looks like they got royally reamed by their followers for their mistake. Glad to see it! They need to be held accountable since so many use them to set the standard.
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English & Linguistics / Re: Dear Expert
« on: March 10, 2016, 06:44:15 PM »
So I read on a grammar blog today that it should be properly (more accurately) called "Daylight Saving Time" not "Daylight Savings Time".
If so, is this not noted in AP Style? Because every headline or article I have read this week has it as Savings.
If so, is this not noted in AP Style? Because every headline or article I have read this week has it as Savings.
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English & Linguistics / Re: Funny English and Linguistics stuff...
« on: February 28, 2016, 06:20:51 PM »
(now I wondered if I've always pronounced "mauve" incorrectly. Oh well, I will blame 'regional dialects')
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English & Linguistics / Re: Funny English and Linguistics stuff...
« on: February 18, 2016, 03:30:37 PM »That's great. Would you mind if I shared it on Twitter?
I sure hope you can -- because I can't see her image (photobucket is blocked at my work); but I can see your Twitter! :-)
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English & Linguistics / Re: The random etymology of the day
« on: February 09, 2016, 07:42:29 PM »It's called punctuation because you are puncturing the text with little dots.
ftw
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English & Linguistics / Re: The random etymology of the day
« on: January 21, 2016, 06:14:04 PM »
Okay, the term "medicine finger" has me curious now...
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English & Linguistics / Re: New column-type thingy
« on: December 22, 2015, 08:37:52 PM »
But they aren't really even quotes from anyone.
A headline that they run as 'Terror attack' foiled in France could just as simply be written Terror Attack Foiled in France. No quotes needed. It drives me nuts because they are so unnecessary and change the whole intonation when I read it.
A headline that they run as 'Terror attack' foiled in France could just as simply be written Terror Attack Foiled in France. No quotes needed. It drives me nuts because they are so unnecessary and change the whole intonation when I read it.
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English & Linguistics / Re: New column-type thingy
« on: December 22, 2015, 07:17:37 PM »
I sure wish there was a way to get that flowchart on the wall of every office at BBC News. I read BBC News and they have a totally inappropriate love for putting all sorts of things inside quotation marks within their headlines. Just go to BBC News website at some point and look for yourself
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English & Linguistics / Re: Literal translations
« on: October 29, 2015, 03:06:55 PM »
Resurrecting this post because its the only one I can find from a search for dinner/supper (I know we've had this converation before)
So haven't we talked about this?
I know growing up on the farm, the mid-day meal was always "lunch" and the evening was "supper" unless it was a big special meal or company meal like "Sunday Dinner"
But while this says it might have been regional -- I then thought about daVinci's "The Last Supper" -- but what language was that originally titled in, that they translated it into "supper"??
So haven't we talked about this?
I know growing up on the farm, the mid-day meal was always "lunch" and the evening was "supper" unless it was a big special meal or company meal like "Sunday Dinner"
But while this says it might have been regional -- I then thought about daVinci's "The Last Supper" -- but what language was that originally titled in, that they translated it into "supper"??
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English & Linguistics / Re: Quotes from work
« on: October 14, 2015, 03:21:20 PM »
I would dearly love to :facepalm: on someone else's face sometimes..
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English & Linguistics / Re: Funny English and Linguistics stuff...
« on: September 17, 2015, 07:34:26 PM »Quotedid... did a rottweiler write this
Wow - that is so bad it hurts to read. I wasn't for sure, at first, whether it was just a very bad copy/paste/editing job (like they left in parts of sentences they meant to overwrite), or what. I have since decided that probably English is not their first language.
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English & Linguistics / Re: English-to-English translation
« on: August 26, 2015, 05:24:05 PM »
I should post that in our company breakroom*
*while we are primarily a United States company, we took over, via acquisition, a similar company in Britain. I have heard rumors that we have had difficulties at times in meetings with them because of the cultural and methodological differences.
*while we are primarily a United States company, we took over, via acquisition, a similar company in Britain. I have heard rumors that we have had difficulties at times in meetings with them because of the cultural and methodological differences.
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English & Linguistics / Re: Language Acquisition
« on: July 29, 2015, 09:26:55 PM »
He had pretty much already created a lot of compensation habits by the time they figured it out (5th grade - there was lots of gnashing of teeth and testing before this was figured out). But as an adult now, I would say it no longer has any significant impact on his life. He chose an occupation that doesn't require a lot of requirement for auditory processing and regurgitation. (as school often is). As the tester said at the time, "once it gets IN [his brain] it is really IN -- he doesn't seem to forget much of anything. But getting it established in, and then getting him to also be able to coherently output the information -- that is a real struggle."
That - and I have to say him using the internet daily actually helped as well - the processing of written information (reading, etc.) and interactions via chat, etc.
The testing was done by Heartspring, which was founded on helping kids with auditory issues. Fortunately for me, it is here local.
That - and I have to say him using the internet daily actually helped as well - the processing of written information (reading, etc.) and interactions via chat, etc.
The testing was done by Heartspring, which was founded on helping kids with auditory issues. Fortunately for me, it is here local.
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English & Linguistics / Re: Funny English and Linguistics stuff...
« on: July 29, 2015, 03:16:11 PM »I don't have a problem with the new words, but it's worth pointing out that this is the British Scrabble dictionary, not the American one. That point seems to have been overlooked by pretty much everyone covering this story.
semi-related: I daily play a mobile game called 7 Little Words. And apparently, I have learned, they often use British words that I do not recognize, or British spellings. Which makes it a bit more difficult..