[Closed] Somethink annoying

zokes - Member

tomdebruin - Key Master
it really annoys me how it says 'favorite' on this site

Well, you're the man who can change that! I've been harping on about it for weeks now....

Then there's the use of "Forums" as a plural, when we all know it should be "Fora".

Now, obviously someone will be along in a second with the dictionary, but they'll be wrong. Fora is the correct Latin plural and it's a Latin word. So nerrr.

Then there's the use of "Forums" as a plural, when we all know it should be "Fora"

Ahem:

forum n. (pl. forums)

1) a meeting or medium for an exchange of views.
2) (pl. fora) (in an ancient Roman city) a public square or marketplace used for judicial and other business. Origin ME: from Latin, lit. what is out of doors.

[i]Then there's the use of "Forums" as a plural, when we all know it should be "Fora" [/i]

[pedantic mode on]There should be a full stop at the end of that sentence.[pedantic mode off]

Like "mountain biking", which should be "mountain bike riding"?

actually "mountain bike rider participation" to remove the final wicked "ing"

Then there's the use of "Forums" as a plural, when we all know it should be "Fora"

dictionary.com has:

fo?rum [fawr-uhm, fohr-uhm]
–noun, plural fo?rums, fo?ra ?

(I love the edit feature....!)

Sports people who reply to an interview question and use both yes (yeah) and no in the same answer.

Fora is the correct Latin plural and it's a Latin word. So nerrr.

I missed that on first reading, but perhaps the writer has forgotten that we are using English ?

amo,amas,amat,hic,haic,hoc

perhaps it's churlish to suggest that this is not in fact, "The marketplace or public square of an ancient Roman city", and at the time parchment was not able to connect to the interweb...

[i]Sports people who reply to an interview question and use both yes (yeah) and no in the same answer. [/i]

It's not just sports, my former boss used to answer most questions like that, by starting "Yeah, no it's...."
And verbification as pointed out by Captain Flasheart was annoyingly prevalent in the Olympics coverage: "And more news from the velodrome where .... has medalled in the .... event"
Has WON A MEDAL! Not MEDALLED.

And breathe...

Can we please make it a regular friday thread?
So I can keep in touch with the correct use of the English language.
I am fearing that one year in France with no or very little practice, will not do any good to my rather poor grammar.

[i]Has WON A MEDAL! Not MEDALLED[/i]
From the OED
1. trans. To decorate or honour with a medal; to confer a medal upon as a mark of distinction. Usu. in pass.

1822 BYRON Let. 4 May (1979) IX. 154 He was medalled. 1860 THACKERAY Nil nisi Bonum in Roundabout Papers (1899) 174 Irving went home medalled by the King. 1900 Nation (N.Y.) 4 Oct. 269/2 It would have been much more to the point, anyway, had he [sc. Herr Menzel] exhibited and been medalled [at the Paris Exhibition] as illustrator. 1973 L. M. BOSTON Memory in House ix. 120 Outside it I was introduced to the young illustrator who was also being medalled. 1985 New Yorker 18 Mar. 125/1 He was eulogized..and was renowned and medalled for his war record.
2. intr. U.S. Sport. To win a medal (i.e., to come first, second, or third in a sporting event or competition).

1966 Valley News (Van Nuys, Calif.) 9 June 34 Divers from the Rita Curtis..Club gold-medaled in all of the events but three... In the boys competition the following RCVAC divers medaled:..Phil Loyola, 2nd; [etc.]. 1979 Washington Post 19 June D6/2 Our women are coming along beautifullythey've medaled well recently. 1984 Marathon & Distance Runner Oct. 18/1 Gabriella Dorio made her break too early, otherwise she could have medalled. 1994 Coloradoan (Fort Collins) 6 Feb. E1/1 U.S. bobsledders haven't medaled since 1956.

In the boys competition the following RCVAC divers medaled

thak'll learn ya crazy-legs 🙂

[i]so "fraction of" could mean "bigger than".[/i]

That would be an "improper fraction of".

Verbification.......

The horrid trait of taking a noun and creating a new verb therefrom

Verbing rocks.

when we say "a fraction of something", I think we usually imply a [i]smallish[/i] fraction. I'm not sure where the notional limit would be, something less than 1/8th I think, above which we'd call it a "part" or a "considerable fraction". Interestingly, as it's unspoken, perhaps people have different ideas of just how big a part counts as a fraction in these terms ?

You lot would explode if you lived in the BVI. Grammar here follows a whole different set of rules and drives me bonkers.

Where a word ends in T or ED it's not pronounced so "ACT" is pronounced "ACK", "BAKED" would be pronounced "BAKE" ie, "Tonights special is bake chicken".

The one that realy annoys me though is "Police" used as singular and plural without being prefaced with "The" and "is and are" are frequently used in the wrong context. Even in the media.

ie Police is investigating the Murder, or "Winston is a Police".

From the OED
1. trans. To decorate or honour with a medal; to confer a medal upon as a mark of distinction. Usu. in pass.

Chris hoy was medalled [i]by[/i] the IOC. To say that Chris Hoy medalled is incorrect.

I stood or I was standing.
Not, I was stood, arrgg.
Would people say.... I was slid down the slide no.

[i]You lot would explode if you lived in the BVI.[/i]

Borough of Village Idiots?

[i]thak'll learn ya crazy-legs [/i]
Er no, accoridng to miketuelly above, my post stands as being correct. So there. 😛

Chris hoy was medalled by the IOC. To say that Chris Hoy medalled is incorrect.

BVI British Virgin Isles?

Gotten is a normal word, some people just don't know where to use it. Also, can't get wound up about decimate, the original use was killing one in ten, but as SFB continues to tell us, languages evolve, and now it's taken to mean to "destroy utterly"

loving pedant threads.... 😉

I think Humpty Dumpty has the last say:

'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less.'

Oriented annoys me too.

I don't think the fact that the language "evolves" so fast is a good thing, it makes learning it harder and means less of it gets used and fewer people bother to learn the correct ways - they just get lazy. The one thing I've noticed moving from England to Glasgow is the fact that the people I work with now have a much larger vocabulary than the English people I worked with (on the whole, certain exceptions) and the students seem to have a far better grasp of grammar. Its really nice to see (hear!), I can understand their every word and they can create a descriptive and concise sentence. In England the vast majority seem to start with "err" or "innit just". They might both know the same detail but Crist do the Scots sound more intelligent when they talk! Maybe it shouldn't, but it really does affect the way you think of them, and it affects their written output too, of course.

Obviously we all use scrappy English on forums for speed of response so I'm not professing to be perfect!

Anyone listen to Stephen Fry's podcasts? The latest is on this very topic and he's had a bit of a change of heart. He ridiculed miserable gits who spend their lives moaning on about incorrect apostrophes. Almost converted me...

As he says, Shakespeare made verbs out of nouns all the time!

U-turn Fry, don't listen to him, says whatever gets a laugh.

Our septic friend like to surveille things rather than observe or watch!

On this very site (pre-hack) "Singletrack is a mountain bike magazine based out of Europe".

Since you lot are waaaaay more anal than me, I'm sure I don't need to explain why this is so very wrong.

for sure

[i]cordage, signage and transportation[/i] - always used when a shorter more simpler word would do.
[i]utilised[/i] - nearly always used when used is appropriate
people how use [i]headed[/i] when the appropriate English term is [i]heading[/i].

Shakespeare spelled his own [b]name[/b] 5 different ways, and I found Jane Austen using different spellings for quite a few words in 'Pride & Prejudice'

In a sandwich/coffee shop: '[i]Can I get[/i] the tuna mayo…'. You're in Bracknell, not [i]Manhattan[/i], where we say 'please may I?'

On the train: 'this train will shortly be [i]arriving into[/i]…'

I've given up on the apostrophe. I even find myself in two minds about using it at all, because I know some people will think I've used it incorrectly and judge me, when in fact they'd be wrong.

Slightly more worryingly for me, I've started instead to get annoyed when people use three full stops ... instead of an ellipses … or a hyphen — where they should have used a dash, like that. :-/

Lynne Truss has so much to answer for, I'm glad to hear Stephen Fry has distanced himself from the amateur army of petty pedants who like to sneer at greengrocers' signs.

I'm willing to forgive most minor typos and lax usage of English, but there are a few things that "boil my piss" (including that).

Me: "Have you got the remote control?"
Wife: "I do."
Me: "You mean you have?"
Wife: "I mean I do have."
Me: "No you don't, you were trying to be all American."
Wife: "Shut up."

My pet peeve that I see at work all the time, is people putting a decimal point inbetween the hours and minutes when they write the time. 4.30 instead of 4:30.

4 point 3 hours is somethink (sic) entirely different.

Me: "Have you got the remote control?"
Wife: "I do."
Me: "You mean you have?"
Wife: "I mean I do have."
Me: "No you don't, you were trying to be all American."
Wife: "Shut up."

I do [have] is perfectly acceptable?

init.!

I'll go again....

People saying "Haitch" instead of "aitch" for the letter H.
People saying "I'm just itching myself" - NO YOU'RE NOT!
Can you borrow me a... [starting to see red]

Feel sorry for me.

I am a pedant. I am also a teacher, marking coursework written by 16-year-olds.

Shakespeare spelled his own name 5 different ways

Don't you mean that the person (or persons) who wrote "Shakespeare" couldn't manage to be consistent at spelling his assumed name?

no, I mean, pre-dictionary, people were less hung up on spelling, particularly their names. I believe Walter Raleigh also pronounced his name 'Rayley' or 'Rowley' - it was more mutable...

ellipses

[b]IS[/b] there a '...' key ??

IS there a '...' key ??

[option]+[;] on a Mac. I only said that to be sarcastic though 🙂

"my bad"...WTF??? it either 'my fault' or it isn't

and "can you borrow me a pen?"....no,i can lend you one but i can't borrow you one, idiot!!!

I was having a discussion with my mate who was insistent 'bestest' makes sense.

If something is the best, then can anything really be any better?

OMITN wrote:

Little of this affects (note, not "effects") our understanding, but that's only because some of [b]use[/b] have the brains to understand how it ought to work, but also have to compassion to make allowances for the illiterate and imbecilic.

Sod it.

Sod what?

IS there a '...' key ??

I'd suggest the much more serious issue is using 4 full stops in place of an ellipsis when 3 is perfectly sufficient....

… oooh, yes it works 🙂

but ... is quicker!

actually, I do have an annoyance, which is the use of 'visualise' for 'display' when the former meaning was an act of cognition 🙁