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<p>Violadad - your children are deer?</p>
<p>As for the trap-They must have run into it in the woods.</p>
<p>It drives me crazy to see then used for than, and there used for their.</p>
<p>dstark, The word “that” belongs in your sentence, IMHO.
To figure it out, I mentally substituted the word “unbelievable” for “incredible”
in your sentence, and found my answer. I hope my methodology is sound.</p>
<p>Dstark, that last “that” sounds fine to me. I was going to quote you my high school grammar book, but it’s not where it belongs. Generally who is for people, that for things, which when that already is in the sentence. Here is a site with some examples: <a href=“http://www.grammarbook.com/grammar/whoVwhVt.asp[/url]”>http://www.grammarbook.com/grammar/whoVwhVt.asp</a></p>
<p>I am so not ready for the quiz.</p>
<p>You see this all the time.</p>
<p>“What” schools are you applying to?</p>
<p>“Which” schools are you appying to?</p>
<p>Is “what” ever correct?</p>
<p>mathmom, when you can’t find your h.s. grammar book, is that a misplaced mollifier?</p>
<p>One son always substitutes “then” for “than” when typing papers. He swears he can’t hear the difference when reading it aloud–must be his southern accent.</p>
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<p>Are you saying you have actually seen it spelled that way? Cause I think that rendering is pretty close to the correct pronunciation. OK, vwahlah!</p>
<p>I have actually heard it pronounced viola. (whoops)</p>
<p>mkm, my s does it too! It drives me crazy!</p>
<p>It must be a “southern thang” ;)</p>
<p>P3T: Grooooooooooooooooooooooooooan. That’s one of the best spur of the moment puns I’ve seen in a while. I’ll put you down as a candidate for the Algonquin Club.</p>
<p>world renown for “world renowned”–I have seen this in a letter from a college!</p>
<p>Accommodate, not acommodate or accomodate… I always notice this one. Whenever I see it written correctly, I think to myself, “good for you.” And when it’s not, I feel just the tiniest bit annoyed. </p>
<p>As for grammar, I usually employ the “sounds right” method and I agree with TheDad that “sounds right” is honed by lots of reading. Reading actual writing, mind you, as in newspapers, magazines, and books. Not blogs, chat forums or IMs.
Therefore, “what schools are you applying to?” is wrong because it doesn’t sound right. “Which schools are you applying to?” sounds right. Must be a singular/plural thing, since you would say, “What’s your major?” not “Which is your major?” But then again, you can also ask a singular “which” question, such as “Which school did you decide to attend?” and you can also ask “What is your first-choice college?”</p>
<p>No one ever said English was easy.</p>
<p>yourdictionary.com provides a list of the 100 words most often misspelled:</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.yourdictionary.com/library/misspelled.html[/url]”>http://www.yourdictionary.com/library/misspelled.html</a></p>
<p>Just add one more to make 101 (g).</p>
<p>jazzymom, I guess my problem is, “What schools are you applying to?” sounds ok to me. </p>
<p>Well, I’m tone deaf. :)</p>
<p>I’ve seen voila spelled all sorts of ways by people who clearly never took French. Actually it’s sort of cute. (After all, you know exactly what they meant.) Loose for lose really, really annoys me, because I pronounce loose correctly and then the sentence makes no sense. I plead guilty to their/there and its/it’s - I know the difference, but unless I proofread when I’m typing fast, I type the wrong one more often than not. I had a terrible problem with substituting homonyms when we were living in Germany - I even wrote things like “flower” for “flour”. </p>
<p>Paying3tuitions: Very punny.</p>
<p>Jazzy, I got “accommodate” burned into me some 30+ years ago when I was having to write memos that were forwarded to mucky mucks. My boss appreciated my writing skills…and in fact nudged me along the path of becoming a writer…but she was an absolute stickler about spelling (and I was no slacker at it, having run 3rd against two 6th-graders in an all-school spelling bee when I was in 4th grade). And this was pre-computers, pre-spell checkers…I tell ya, these kids today.</p>
<p>And there are many singular discussions on CC.</p>
<p><tries to=“” bite=“” tongue=“”> <doesn’t succeed=“”> Doesn’t surprise me that someone who speaks Southern as a native would have occasional trouble with conventional spelling. I confess that I sometimes feel like Henry Higgins when I’m around someone with a strong Southern accent, figuring that if the enunciated to the standard they would a) be more widely understood and b) spell better. Then I figure it’s none of my business and an artifact of damnyankee cultural imperialism.</doesn’t></tries></p>
<p>I did, when I was a youngish supervisor very early in my post-college career, once pull aside a black subordinate and suggest that she try not to “ax me a question” but to “ask it.” I think she knew me well enough to know that it wasn’t prejudice but I was nervous nonetheless. I was rewarded years later when I ran into her on the street and she thanked me for having given her that nudge, that she’d made an effort to learn/speak/spell Standard English and had done fairly well because of that. Whew.</p>
<p>Btw, speaking of Higgins, why don’t more people understand that he’s a hero of “My Fair Lady”? And, come to think of it, why <em>can’t</em> a woman be more like a man?</p>
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<p>Oh, Venus, Oh, Mars! TheDad, Would you care to translate that bit of male communication for the female readers on CC?</p>
<p>
No.</p>
<p>Nein.</p>
<p>Nyet.</p>
<p>Non.</p>
<p>Gomen nasai, iye.</p>
<p>Nim.</p>
<p>Ah, I always thought that Mars was a surly fellow.</p>
<p>I will never be able to type on myspace “Bob and I” it will always be “me and Bob.” Alright is perfectly acceptable in my book. Viola is pronounced by me as “waa-laa” not like former Twins pitcher Frank Viola, and I will always spell it “viola.” </p>
<p>A couple of things that annoy me:
People misspelling “guarantee” and “license.” There are no acceptable misspellings of these words, people just spell them wrong all the time.
People spelling “Gibraltar” “Gibralter” God that is annoying.
Also the king’s English is annoying to me. I know that technically centre, defence, realise, etc are not spelled wrong in English English, but they ARE misspelled in American English! Change your spelling for the American message board please!</p>
<p>Ah southern English! For some strange reason my first week in high school they decided to give all us Freshmen a spelling test. The woman who read the test had a very thick accent. The word was “refuhhhhd”. I was baffled. I asked her to repeat it. Still baffled. She put it in a sentence. “He refuhhhed it to me.” I was still baffled. I wrote “refud”. They didn’t make me do remedial spelling. :)</p>