Friday Follies #107 – Making Grammar Great Again, One Hyphen at a Time

~ Ellie

I hope everyone’s had a lovely week. The Grammar Cop, on the other hand, has had a rather less-than-lovely week, due to the infractions she came upon in the line of duty. It’s a tough job, but somebody’s gotta do it.

  1. HUFFINGTONPOST.COM: “He was taking Accutane at the time, and his skin was pealing all over his face.”
  2. YAHOO.COM: “…it’s moving perilously towards the densely populated state, where its 185 mph winds would be devestating.“
  3. THE SUBURBAN: “…Lifetime Achievement Award by Charles Biddle Jr. for his legendary carrier that spanned seven decades.”

 

 

The corrections are:

  1. Regardless of whose face it was, I don’t think that bells were ringing (“pealing”) all over it. The word should be peeling.
  2. First of all, kudos to Yahoo.com for the correct use of “it’s” and “its.” Too bad they countered that victory with the misspelling of devastating.
  3. This, I admit, gave me pause. Did Mr. Biddle own an amazing carrier pigeon? Did he have a (misspelled) French carrière? Wrong on both counts! After a tad more thought, I hit upon the intended word: career. 

I do hope that none of you, dear readers, are making a career out of error-ridden English. And if ever you are stuck with a grammar question, go ahead and ask the Grammar Cop and she will laugh at you set you straight try to help you out.

 

9 thoughts on “Friday Follies #107 – Making Grammar Great Again, One Hyphen at a Time”

  1. Thanks for another lesson, Ellie. The first two were easy, but I couldn’t crack number three. Maybe Mr. Biddle is well-known, but I didn’t recognize him. There was no way I would have known what spanned seven decades, although I have personally spanned seven decades and more. With that stretch, looks like I’d be thinner.

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