Grammar, Punctuation, Spelling, etc.

[Old toby's wicked weed]

i be also not english normal speaking person.
now i be confused.
is it not right for me to be ok to be here and join in tolkien talking?

forgive my understanding, but what tolkien to do with nazi?

you make me now feel ashamed me not correct speak englis yet.

lordy, will it be good and ok here to be?

[Lotesse]

I used to really pride myself on my once-perfect grammar and spelling abilities. I think I've slipped a lot, though, over the last five years or so especially. I allowed myself to get too accepting of and relaxed about "street" grammar, both in spoken and in written form, and this combined with spending a few years not really seriously reading or writing did a bit of atrophy damage to my once perfect grammatical skills. Ah, well. My old skills are coming back a little, but nothing like they once were.

[Old toby's wicked weed]

very good miss lotese they seem me to. wish i had also that english. but i try now hard. much i learn from mr tolkien, and his very good books.

[Lotesse]

Well, much you can learn from JRR Tolkien - I learn from him, even now, every time I re-read his works. He had absolutely perfect grammar. He was a professor of English at Cambridge. His writing is literally flawless.

[Rían]

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

I brought "Grammar Nazi" from Queen of Wands and boards all across the internet. I can't take credit for that one.

oh, ok - it's funny, though

How do you say this properly:

The dog of my brother and I needed to be spayed.

Referring to a dog that belongs to myself and my brother. I can't figure it out.

I'd chicken out and say, "Our dog needed to be spayed."

But I think it would be this: "My brother's and my dog needed to be spayed."

Originally Posted by Jon

Sween once said: "If people spent all there time correcting people spelling (well mine at any rate) we would never get and drinking or eating done"

I think he had a point.

Oh, I do, too, and that's why I ignore about 99.9 percent of those types of errors here.

I think the main point of this thread was to commiserate with other people that find the improper use of apostrophes and the like painful! It was just kind of a, "oh, you have that funny reaction, too?" type of thing.

Yeah, Sween was a kick, wasn't he?

Originally Posted by Eärniel

Dutch spelling rules, no, let's not go there.

I can't even comprehend why they would change spelling?!@?! I've never heard of any other country that does that - what's up?

[Nurvingiel]

Lotesse, I also admire Tolkien's utterly flawless and poetic execution of the English language. The way he conveyed character through dialogue is also brilliant.

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

oh, ok - it's funny, though

I'd chicken out and say, "Our dog needed to be spayed."

But I think it would be this: "My brother's and my dog needed to be spayed."

The problem is, the first sentence doesn't say who the other dog owner is (besides myself), and the second one implies there are two dogs.

I posted a real stumper there eh?

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

I think the main point of this thread was to commiserate with other people that find the improper use of apostrophes and the like painful! It was just kind of a, "oh, you have that funny reaction, too?" type of thing.

My goodness yes!!

The other day, I went to the driving range with my boyfriend and we hit a bucket of balls, then had lunch in the clubhouse. Fun! In the clubhouse was a photo of someone who had won a golf tournament there. The caption under the woman's photo read: "[person's name] Ladie's 2005 Champion"

I stared at it a moment, because it seemed wrong. Unnatural. After a moment I realised brutal abuse of an innocent apostrophe was occuring! It should read Ladies' Champion, if anything, because she'd be the champion of all the female golfers at the club. However, I think Ladies Champion is correct because she's the champion of the ladies tournament, no possession is actually indicated here.

Am I right? Can I get a booyah?

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

I can't even comprehend why they would change spelling?!@?! I've never heard of any other country that does that - what's up?

Are you referring to Dutch people spelling in English, or Dutch spelling (of Dutch) Eärniel? (Since this is the Grammar Nazi thread, I actually went to another message board, typed the alt code for an A umlaut, and pasted it here. I also checked the spelling of umlaut. As my boyfriend would say, "Anal!" )

[Lotesse]

Yeah, I think it is Ladies Champion. That's hilarious that they'd put "Ladie's Champion." I mean, who are these people that even think for a moment that this is correct grammar? And if someone saw it and realised it was incorrect, which I can only surmise that there'd have to be others who noticed, how are they going to just keep walking past it and let it stay so glaringly incorrect like that? I just - I don't get it. Who are these people?

The dog spaying sentence is a doozy. "The dog belonging to me and my brother needed to be spayed?" Hmm. Still sounds awkward. That's a toughie.

[Grey_Wolf]

Originally Posted by Old toby's wicked weed

i be also not english normal speaking person.
now i be confused.
is it not right for me to be ok to be here and join in tolkien talking?

forgive my understanding, but what tolkien to do with nazi?

you make me now feel ashamed me not correct speak englis yet.

lordy, will it be good and ok here to be?

Well, Toby, it's quite ok for u to be here. The whole grammar nazi thing is for fun only.

It just means a person is overly zealous in the pointing out of specific spelling errors.

And do read Tolkien. His King's English is a perfect tool for learning the language.

[Rev. Justin Timberlake]

Originally Posted by Lotesse

The dog spaying sentence is a doozy. "The dog belonging to me and my brother needed to be spayed?"

Your brother needed to be spayed?

[Grey_Wolf]

...moved to the café...

[Nurvingiel]

I don't know what that has to do with grammar, but that was great.

Originally Posted by Rev. Justin Timberlake

Your brother needed to be spayed?

And that, my friends, is why proper grammar is a must.

[Grey_Wolf]

Thanks. I'll move it to the café.

[Earniel]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

I can't even comprehend why they would change spelling?!@?! I've never heard of any other country that does that - what's up?

Well, the idea is to simplify and to get a uniform spelling, except that they always end up doing the opposite thing, which then calls for a new spelling change, etc... it's a never ending spiral of misery.

Since Belgium and the Netherlands both share Dutch as an official language, we've tried to keep our spelling identical. Hence we've made a committee for it (we like committees, there's endless talk, nothing ever gets done right but somehow people are satisfied because a committee is looking into matters so it must be alright and the committee members get a job and can all act important.)

Dutch is by no means an easy language to spell, even worse now since they're constantly changing the rules for it. We were promised that the spelling wouldn't change for another 10 years since we've just had some major reformation of the spelling rules. (You can tell how bad things are if they have to promise us to keep their hands off our spelling.)

And what do you know, a few months ago.. poof! New spelling. But they really overdid it this time. Some of the changes are... pathetic to say the least. Simplification? My eye! There are now several organisations of writers and journalists that simply refuse to follow the new spelling.

When I was in school the use of 'k' and 'c' changed practically every year. I still don't know whether I am required to type 'insect' or 'insekt'.

So Dutch spelling... let's not go there.

Oh, darn... I just did anyway, didn't I?

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

Are you referring to Dutch people spelling in English, or Dutch spelling (of Dutch) Eärniel? (Since this is the Grammar Nazi thread, I actually went to another message board, typed the alt code for an A umlaut, and pasted it here. I also checked the spelling of umlaut. As my boyfriend would say, "Anal!" )

Dutch Dutch spelling. The Dutch spelling of English would probably be even more atrocious. Phonetically your 'a' would become 'ej', your 'e' would become 'ie', your 'i' would be an 'ai' etc...

(By the way, the extra effort for the ä is appreciated. I like accents.)

[littleadanel]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

I can't even comprehend why they would change spelling?!@?! I've never heard of any other country that does that - what's up?

According to my knowledge, German spelling was changed as well - they replaced that B-like s with double s. I don't really remember the details... IIRC, they said it was for simplicity, but many people didn't want it to be changed, so they reached a compromise and left it in some words and changed it in others. If someone knows I'm wrong, do correct me.

Similar ideas have been popping up in my language as well, but thank goodness they weren't successful. At least no major changes, like that double s thing in German.

[littleadanel]

Eärniel, that really sounds like a nightmare.

(And I can write ä by pressing AltGr + a! )

[Earniel]

Originally Posted by littleadanel

According to my knowledge, German spelling was changed as well - they replaced that B-like s with double s. I don't really remember the details... IIRC, they said it was for simplicity, but many people didn't want it to be changed, so they reached a compromise and left it in some words and changed it in others. If someone knows I'm wrong, do correct me.

Yes, that sounds about right. When I started getting German in highschool, there was a mention about a changing in the use of 'β'. But that is peanuts compared what they put Dutch through.

Originally Posted by littleadanel

Eärniel, that really sounds like a nightmare.

(And I can write ä by pressing AltGr + a! )

It's worse for school kids, they have to learn the new spelling rules. People who are out of school like me can just ignore them. Unless you run into a Spelling Nazi (have understandibly yet to meet one besides one or two Dutch teachers ) of course.

[Jonathan]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

I can't even comprehend why they would change spelling?!@?! I've never heard of any other country that does that - what's up?

It's not that uncommon really. In recent years, languages like German and Dutch have had spelling reforms and Swedish had some changed spelling as well in the beginning of the 20th century. Also, it's because of a British spelling reform long ago that there's a pointless silent 'd' in admiral among other things. So your language has been subjected to reforms too

[Grey_Wolf]

Words that mean different things depending on spelling and pronounciantion...here is a few of them in Swedish.

�nden - the duck
Andén - the spirit

Avladé - reported
�vlade - gave birth

Bildrullen - bad driver
Bildrullen - the roll of film

Brúnnen - the well
Brunnén - burnt up

Cykél - the bike
Cýkel - the cycle

Filen - the file
Filén - the fillet

Hov (pron. hoov) - horseshoe
Hov (pron. hauv, au as in French) - court.

Hundring - a dog toy
Hundring - a hundred (kronor)

Inkastad - Thrown in
Inkastad - A city in the Inca realm.

...just to mention a few.

[Nurvingiel]

Originally Posted by Grey_Wolf

Swedish pronounciation.

*dies a little inside*

But Jonathan, you do pronounce the "d" in "admiral".

[BeardofPants]

Yup, yup.
*waits patiently for Jon to come back and explain himself