Grammar Pet Peeves

[Django]

 

[Loubywoobywoo]

One pet peeve I'm seeing creeping in is a lot of lax Americanisms of word usage or sentence structure. In the capacity I work, communication and English skills are pretty key, so it's becoming a bit of a mare seeing many of my colleagues, who should know better, lapsing into these.

Some of the top ones:

1. Confusing 'bring' and 'take'
2. Confusing 'come' and 'go'
3. Saying 'amends' instead of 'amendments' — this is my favourite one because we get many people constantly 'making amends' with text documents in some ongoing, obviously tumultuous relationship
4. Similarly, saying the likes of 'disconnect' and 'intent' to avoid that extra syllable of '-ion'

I get annoyed by Americanisms creeping in everywhere! My phone keeps correcting ill to I’ll. No, I won’t write « sick », as if I say I have been sick, that means I vomited, not that I was poorly/unwell.
Also nail polish instead of nail varnish annoys me no end, as does pants for trousers, said by an Irish colleague!
It annoys me that Brits make the effort to learn the US word ( elevator, trunk, pants…) but if you say lift, car boot and trousers in the US, you are met with blank stares. It just does my head in!

 

[AliceInWanderLost]

I’ve noticed a lot of ‘prolly’ instead of probably online, which makes my eye twitch. The other thing I can’t abide are the adoption of American phrases- ‘I could care less’ or ‘I did it on accident’. They get on my pip!

i hear "i could care less" constantly and it makes me want to scratch out my eyes. how can you not understand that it doesn't make sense in the context of saying you don't care?! ARGH.

 

[Becclo44]

I’m certainly no grammar queen myself, but seen - why do I keep seeing people say ‘I seen this’ or ‘I seen this in the shop’. What?! Do people actually say that? It makes no sense. It’s so annoying and I keep seeing it everywhere!

 

[YetAnotherObsessionx]

A new one I've spotted while trying to avoid all the Black Friday ads is people typing palate or pallet when they mean palette.

As in 'I've just been gifted this AMAZING eyeshadow pallet' makes me wonder just how much eyeshadow a person can possibly need...

 

[Rodneytrotter]

Where I used to work people would mix up was/ were. As an example they might say 'you was very good today'. These people were teachers and teaching assistants.

 

[Happy Lady]

Similarly, I hate when people say "I'll write you!" - it's "I'll write TOO you", ffs!

Erm ... Sorry but it's "I'll write TO you".

The word TOO means "and" or "also".

 

[AliceInWanderLost]

Erm ... Sorry but it's "I'll write TO you".

The word TOO means "and" or "also".

argh! the worst thing is that i very much know the difference between to and too. the shame!

 

[Melian]

Text speak. There's no limit (ok, there might be; but it's huge) on characters on Facebook and forums.

 

[Django]

I work in the education sector and today a colleague wrote to me using "your" instead of "you're"

It's really sad when educators can't get it right, the children they are teaching don't stand a hope
This is from the website of a school that one of my daughters was looking at for her son.

 

[Milktray]

A posh lady I know pronounces a sharp T sound like SH- whash was thash?

Oh my God, this just made me remember a time when a 'posh lady' called our office (I worked in travel).
She says, 'Oh hello, I'm running late because I'm stuck in Splarshen Darsh.

Cue me, wondering where the hell Splarshen Darsh is.

I responded with 'Can I take your booking reference?'
'No, I've not made a booking'
'Ok, we'll make one now for you'
'I don't need a booking. I'm in my car'
'Ok...erm...'
She proceeded to tell me that she worked in our Head Office (down South) and was visiting our office (up North) but was stuck in Splarshen Darsh.

I said that I'll pass the message on. So informed my big boss, who looks at me and says 'Where the hell is Splarshen Darsh?' Thinking she was coming via Germany (in her car!! )
Google gets involved. Everyone around gets involved.

10 minutes later she arrives.
We discovered that Splarshen Darsh was actually Splash and Dash and she was getting her car washed.

Oh the embarrassment!

 

[MaineCoonMama]

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!

I think I don't breathe when I read that shit, that's why I get so annoyed, ha.

 

[watermelon sugar]

Things don’t really bother me tbh, what’s worse is when you’re reading a good Facebook argument and someone’s comeback is correcting them by saying ‘you’re*’ like oh God, you’re original

On tattle when you get a looooooong post with barely any full stops or commas. Like……

 

[Pawpaw365]

When people use more than three dots in an ellipsis. Gets me all twitchy

How come........

 

[Lazarus]

Work colleagues.
By definition a colleague is someone you work with, it doesn’t require the ‘work’ preface.
Also; the way some people in Liverpool say ‘I’m goin the Asda’ my skin is itching at the thought of it.

 

[Fledgling Psycho]

I saw "more than lightly" today on a post on Mumsnet.

As in it was more than likely.

 

[bubbadabut]

People who consistently spell someone's name wrong, even when they've known them for years, or when the name is right there in front of them on an email or social media. I'm thinking Micheal/Michael, Jane/Jayne, Jackie/Jacqui, etc.

 

[Ilikethisname]

Loose instead of lose drives me mad. When you 'lose' something you lose an o.

 

[LittleMy]

People who merge words that don’t work together as one.

Ex. “noone” instead of “no one”.

 

[Gloria Rostron]

Its A long while since i looked at this thread you is been very interesting i seen this sort of thing on post's and statuse's people just dont understand how to type propely