(GEN) Reviewers Please Read...

OK, now this thread is just too good to pass up.

The following always send my blood pressure through the roof:

Misusing "myself". It seems that my fellow Americans have been put through the ringer when young about the misuse of "me" when one is supposed to say "I". So now they always err on the side of caution, and NEVER use "me", even when it is correct. Instead, they use "myself".

*"If you have any questions, call John or myself."

*"Bill, Mike and myself went to the model show."

*"The play was baffling to everyone, myself included."

AAAARRRRGGGGHHHHH!!!!!!!

Let's get this straight: "myself" is a reflexive pronoun. It "reflects" back onto the subject of the sentence, which is usually "I". For example: "I hurt myself." or, "I built the model myself." or, "John is beside himself." (Don't even get me started on "hisself"!)

In most every case, the proper term to use is ME, or sometimes I.

*"If you have any questions, call John or ME."

*"Bill, Mike and I went to the model show."

*"The play was baffling to everyone, ME included."

The scary thing about this one is its widespread misuse, from everyday chimps on the street, to newscasters and politicians. It's positively frightening.

Now onto laziness in email:

I have spoken to otherwise intelligent and educated people, and it's truly amazing how many of them feel that it is OK to write email in a sloppy manner. You know what I mean: never capitalizing "I", skipping punctuation, not using any capitals at all. And the latest one, I have NO idea where this originated, is to skip using the space after a punctuation mark. What the hell is THAT all about? I run my own website, which receives a LOT of email each week, and here is an example of some of the messages I see:

"i really like your website.it motivates me to build many more models,and it helps to develop my skills.the gallery is especially impressive and i wish that i could build half as good as the other modelers there.do you know where i can find revell kits in the us?i don't like to order from overseas."

I am sure that many of these people think that I'm a prick, since they never get a response from me. I'm sorry, but it's hard enough keeping up with correspondence as it is, without trying to wrap my brain around a message like that one, so I usually just delete them.

OK. I'm done now.

You guys are right; this DOES feel good!

-Doug

-- Doug Chaltry "On The Way!" - 1/72nd Scale Armor Modeling on the World Wide Web.

cannot

:-)

Art

...

And yet the same people rarely have a problem picking the right word when talking about only one person. All they'd have to do is try the same sentence without mentioning the other people, and they'd know whether it should be "I" or "me". Using your examples:

• "If you have any questions, call _me_."

• "_I_ went to the model show."

• "The play was baffling to _me_."

Don't forget "definately".

My current peeve is the sportsworld use of the present tense to describe the past perfect conditional or the future conditional, to wit:

"He catches that pass, we win."

when they should have said, "If he had caught that pass, we would have won."; or, "If he catches the next pass, we will win."

Then there is the sportscasters use of "better". "He's one of the better pitchers in baseball." Oh, really? There can be only one pitcher better than another. However, I suspect there are more than two pitchers in all of baseball. They evidently were never taught the difference between good, better and best.

My all-time favorite sportscaster idiocy is, "He runs with reckless abandon", which is the same as saying "He runs with reckless recklessness."

Another is the word "sunk" although through consistent misuse it is becoming more acceptable to say "He sunk the Japanese ship." Sink, sank, sunk. The same with dive, dived, dived. I guess over time it will become "dive, dove, diven". :-)

However, I do recognize that the use of keyboards leeds to miny nispelt wurds vecause peeple ar n a hury. :-)

Art

My pet peeve is people using "unique" with a modifier, as in "That's a very unique plane".

NO, ITS NOT!

It is either different from anything else in the multiverse, in which case it actually IS unique, or it is the same as some other thing, in which case it isn't unique at all. No ground between.

Gee, I feel MUCH better now.

Cliff. Jones

Well, my Oxford American dictionary defines... Oh, good Lord, here I go again! 'Physic' as in laxative; as in the remedy I need as I'm very full of sh*t... I'm certain your 'physic' and my 'physic' are culled from the same source. And yes, I would be a "Professional Upper Colon Administrator" or PUCA for short.

Now, is that 'pyoo-ka' or 'poo-ka'?...

Frank Kranick

Testors, or Sackcrete?..

That migarated east from inner city Chicago...

Yes - glad to see that this thread has been cemented with some concrete evidence...

Pah-yook?..

Probably yellowish-green. ;)

Bill Banaszak, MFE

Personal annoyance for me is the use of the letter "z" when an "s" should be used.

Analyze as apposed to analyse, serialize against serialise.

Then there is: "zed" vs "zee"; "the" vs "tha"; "filim" vs "film" and a host of others.

Right on, Dave! I sometimes sit here sounding out what I'm reading for the cheap thrill. :)

The one that I see that always drives me bonkers is 'definate'. It's 'definite' from the same root as 'infinite' and 'finish'. Uh-oh, I think I see where the problem starts. We never finish anything, therefore we're unfamiliar with the concept...

Bill Banaszak, MFE

Cougar.

Bill Banaszak, MFE ;)

Let me guess, Lima, Ohio?

Bill Banaszak, MFE

He wouldn't be the first to pronounce it that way. We used to giggle over Eisenhower's attempts. And condoleezzas have two Zs. :)

Bill Banaszak, MFE

For meaning creep try 'awesome'. Even 'nice' had a different meaning in Shakespeare's time.

Bill Banaszak, MFE

If you run into Woody Allen carrying an axe while running down the street, don't listen to him.

Bill Banaszak, MFE