Grammar Pet Peeves

[Pawpaw365]

I have been reading a few threads today and some of them I've had to stop reading, because I was so irritated by the amount of times people have said 'could of / should of / would of'. I don't know why this bothers me so much, but just wondered if anyone else has any particular grammar pet peeves?! So that we can be old and grumpy together haha!

 

[MaineCoonMama]

The manager of a company I used to work for once put a sign up over the recycling bin advising what could go in there, he gave everything the good old possessive apostrophe. Can's, Bottle's, Paper's.
I couldn't look at it without cringing.

 

[Melian]

People who've never heard of commas or paragraphs.

 

[LittleMy]

The common confusion between there, their and they’re. Does my nut in.

There are people who didn’t listen to their teacher’s grammar lessons, and they’re driving me mad.

I think the main problem is that a lot of people are lazy and will type in the way they would speak.

 

[FoxyBingo]

People who say "brought" instead of bought. "He brought me a necklace for Christmas"......no, just no. Stop it.

 

[bubbadabut]

Of and off is another common one, bugs me no end because they don't sound the same.

When people finish their rant with "End off"

 

[MaineCoonMama]

Using 'of' instead of 'have' annoys me as well. It doesn't make sense and is something we learned in primary school. Misplaced apostrophes...sorry, apostrophe's. Ugh.

 

[ZoraZ]

One that really annoys me is when people use too and to in the wrong context primary school level English

 

[Purrrrrrr]

Could of, would of, should of are probably because teachers /parents say would've, could've, should've rather than the whole words. could have, should have, would have. listening to it it could easily be mistaken for would of etc

I'm dyslexic but try really hard to work out everything before posting, it's not easy for me especially when I make a mistake and just cannot see it. I was put into the dunce class at school (back in the 60s) and it affected me a lot confidence-wise. I am not that bad now but really hate it when you are debating a subject someone pulls you up on spelling or grammar. Time and a place

I remember a lovely man on a digital spy who made a thread especially for me and others like me where people who were good at these things could explain how and why we were going wrong in a sentence we had posted on other threads. it was non-judgmental and really helpful

Sorry went off on one a bit there.

 

[FoxyBingo]

Lack of punctuation is a big one for me. These are the same people likely to go on a Facebook rant without using one comma, and to me it feels like they are running out of breath!

 

[FoxyBingo]

People Who Write Like This.......it's wrong and it takes more energy. Why do it?

 

[Pawpaw365]

Using 'of' instead of 'have' annoys me as well. It doesn't make sense and is something we learned in primary school. Misplaced apostrophes...sorry, apostrophe's. Ugh.

Haha agreed. It’s like, you say ‘I have been to the shops’, not ‘I of been to the shops’.

 

[MaineCoonMama]

I know someone who says Aks instead of ask, I really want to hear them say mask. Maks.

 

[Giggling Squid]

Your / you’re
There / their / they’re
Where / were

But my biggest one

Random CaPiTAlisation. Not just the random letters, but also incorrect capitalisation of words.

 

[emphiii]

Saw this in Tesco the other day...

 

[bubbadabut]

The worst thing about the should of/would of/could of, is that a lot of time it's being done by people who should know better. People who are of my generation (born early 80s) who know full well that this is incorrect, but seem to have adopted this new way of writing in recent years. My sister being one of them. I pulled her up on it the first time she did it, and she's never done it again since

People who don't know the difference between "lose" and "loose" annoy me too. Oh, and "to" and "too".

 

[Loubywoobywoo]

My major pet peeve is people who don’t know when to use subject or object pronouns (I/me). I have had colleagues ( when I worked in a school!) tell me “You can always call on S or I for help”, and so many vloggers say things like ‘I just made lunch for my husband and I”. The best/worst ones are horrible language manglings like “it’s my husband and I’s anniversary” which makes me shudder. It isn’t even a hard rule to master, you take out the “X and” bit and see if you would say I or me by itself, no need to understand the grammar behind it, though why that isn’t being taught in schools just beggars belief. It often crops up in scripted TV shows, tomy great chagrin, as this means no-one on the writing/acting team picked up on the mistake at any point, or if they did, they didn’t address it!
Another school colleague used to put the past tense where a past participle should go, so would tell children they should “have went to the toilet before we went to the park”. So many influencers make this mistake, it drives me bonkers to hear “I have ran” and other such delights! Again, it‘s really not that hard to get it right!
Perhaps it’s just because I was made to sit in front of a mirror and say things like “these three things” until I stopped pronouncing my th’s as f’s as a young child, but hearing people say ‘Fanks, I fink it was a fing I fought about free times” just makes my ears bleed! The k sound for words that end in g gets on my nerves too, and don’t get me started on people dropping their h’s and especially their t’s - no Collaeral Beauy is not the name of the film you saw, it’s Collateral Beauty!
I am thrilled to find this thread! My mum did an English Lit degree and has always made sure (my siblings and) I speak properly, correcting our mistakes and explaining the rule(s) until we understood it/them and could spread the word. We weren’t allowed to watch Eastenders as the characters use incorrect language like ain’t, drop their t’s and pronounce th as f quite often!

 

[or JusRollWithIt]

 

[Curly Top]

I was sat. Hate this. It's I was sitting.

Where I live a lot of people say "You was there" not "you were there." After 20 years in the area it still grates.

 

[Mamacita]

Something I always see English people (don't shout at me please ) writing..."I opened my chest of draws" NO!

Even worse, chester draws