[Cyberyeti]

 kenberg, on 2015-July-07, 16:54, said:

Being married to the most beautiful woman in the world is a good hypothetical. Well, maybe.

The virtual divorce is a lot cheaper too

[barmar]

The thing that makes me cringe every time I see it is when people spell "probably" as "prolly". I could understand if someone write "probly", as that's pretty close to how it's pronounced.

[Zelandakh]

 barmar, on 2015-July-08, 12:52, said:

The thing that makes me cringe every time I see it is when people spell "probably" as "prolly". I could understand if someone write "probly", as that's pretty close to how it's pronounced.

It is cute Barry! You might be surprised to know that when I was younger I wrote almost everything in a fairly extreme form of abbreviated text. That was well before texting and, to start with, technically even before the internet as we were still using JANET over here at the time (1989). I have to admit I never used prolly though.

[gwnn]

 barmar, on 2015-July-08, 12:52, said:

The thing that makes me cringe every time I see it is when people spell "probably" as "prolly". I could understand if someone write "probly", as that's pretty close to how it's pronounced.

My pet peeve is when someone has more pet peeves than me (or at least posts more in the pet peeve thread than I do).

barmar 98
gwnn 98

gogogo! anyone else who still wants to dispute 'very unique'? I have another 12 meaningless examples that can support my position.

[Fluffy]

You prolly can beat anyone on that matter gwn, after all Real Madrid's fans are all a bunch of complainers just like the players.

[gwnn]

 Fluffy, on 2015-July-09, 09:26, said:

You prolly can beat anyone on that matter gwn, after all Real Madrid's fans are all a bunch of complainers just like the players.

Nobody can beat Atletico fans at complaining about the referees and conspiracies though.

edit: woo hoo! one more until 100!

[Zelandakh]

My pet peeve is posters with 100+ posts in the pet peeve thread.

[gwnn]

 Zelandakh, on 2015-July-09, 09:56, said:

My pet peeve is posters with 100+ posts in the pet peeve thread.

I should be careful not to post again, then.

edit: oh noes!

This post has been edited by gwnn: 2015-July-09, 10:00

[GreenMan]

 barmar, on 2015-July-08, 12:52, said:

The thing that makes me cringe every time I see it is when people spell "probably" as "prolly". I could understand if someone write "probly", as that's pretty close to how it's pronounced.

In everyday speech "prolly" is faithful to a very common pronunciation.

[Vampyr]

I hate off-ten. Surely most English speakers know how to spell the name of a swimming animal: GHOST.

GH as in "enough", O as in "women", S as in "sugar", O as in "often". OK, usually "listen".

[kenberg]

 Vampyr, on 2015-July-11, 18:16, said:

I hate off-ten. Surely most English speakers know how to spell the name of a swimming animal: GHOST.

GH as in "enough", O as in "women", S as in "sugar", O as in "often". OK, usually "listen".

Growing up I learned many ad hoc pronunciation rules, some valid, some maybe not. I was told we do things offen, not often. No reason was given. Also, far up north we find the Artic regions, not the Arctic. And, for some reason, February was to be pronounced Feb u air ee, first r silent. No reasons were given. The Cambridge online dictionary at
http://dictionary.ca.../british/arctic
gives a silent r in arctic for British pronunciation and a non-silent r for American English. I can't imagine how the British pronunciation took hold in Minnesota, but anyway Brits seem to drop the r not the c. At least we still spoke of Mary Magdalene in a recognizable way. I was in Oxford oncce and for quite a while I had no idea where this Maudlin College was.


In Minnesota we went wading in the crick, not the creek. And we fished for croppies, despite the correct spelling of crappies.

When I was 13 or so I had a friend who I think never lived two years in the same state. His pronunciation was literally all over the map. If I won a point at deuce in tennis, he would say "Your odd". Later there was a friend from Boston who always wanted to go to the pork. He was not hungry for ribs, he liked to go hiking out in the woods.

I remembered GHOST from a long ago quiz book. Something like "What swims in the lake and is pronounced ghost?". I had to look up the answer.

[barmar]

 Vampyr, on 2015-July-11, 18:16, said:

I hate off-ten.

My dictionary says either pronunciation is acceptable, but "offen" is more common.

Grammarphobia has an article about how this situation came about: in the 15th century, many letters became silent to make clusters of consonants easier to pronounce. In the 19th century, as public education spread, more people learned to spell, and they saw these letters, and started pronouncing some of them again. So pronouncing the "t" in "often" was a sign of being educated.

[Cyberyeti]

 barmar, on 2015-July-13, 12:55, said:

My dictionary says either pronunciation is acceptable, but "offen" is more common.

Grammarphobia has an article about how this situation came about: in the 15th century, many letters became silent to make clusters of consonants easier to pronounce. In the 19th century, as public education spread, more people learned to spell, and they saw these letters, and started pronouncing some of them again. So pronouncing the "t" in "often" was a sign of being educated.

You should come to Norfolk if you want to see consonants and indeed whole syllables go missing. Examples from our placenames:

Garboldisham - pronounced Garblesm or Garbleshm
Tacolneston - pronounced Tackleston
Stiffkey - pronounced Stukey

[mikeh]

I used to be, and still am on occasion, a pedant in terms of the correct usage of language. As an example, I used to chafe at television announcers (predominantly sports announcers) using the word 'good' when they meant 'well'. As in: he's playing really good right now.

However, languages are living, evolving concepts. This includes not only neologisms, but also variations in usage. That includes the meaning to be given to words such as unique.

So I personally am not troubled by anyone who claims that going to see, say, Clapton in a concert that is the 9th out of 16 scheduled concerts over 3 months offers me a 'unique' opportunity to see a rock genius live.

However, I remain absolutely appalled by the use of absolutely when the word absolutely ought absolutely not to be used in the context in which it often appears.

As in Clapton is absolutely the best rock genius of all time. Anyone who argues with me is absolutely wrong. Am I sure I am right? Absolutely.

Anyway, I absolutely love the pet peeves thread. It is absolutely the best part of the WC.

[blackshoe]

I was somewhat amused (and somewhat bemused) when many years ago I first read L. Neil Smith's alternate world story The Probability Broach, wherein the Vice-President of the North American Confederacy is one Dr. Olongo Featherstone-Haugh, whose surname is pronounced "Fanshaw". BTW, Dr. Fanshaw is a Mountain Gorilla.

[mikeh]

my favourite example of how difficult it must be for a non-English speaker to learn UK English is the name Cholmondeley.......an old aristocratic name, pronounced, of course, chum-li. Try getting that right in a spelling bee if you haven't seen it before.

[Cyberyeti]

 mikeh, on 2015-July-13, 18:04, said:

my favourite example of how difficult it must be for a non-English speaker to learn UK English is the name Cholmondeley.......an old aristocratic name, pronounced, of course, chum-li. Try getting that right in a spelling bee if you haven't seen it before.

I think the worst bit of English particularly for people with phonetic languages as their first one is getting your head round things like:

plough
though
thought
through
tough
trough

[helene_t]

What I find difficult in English is that you cannot see on a word which grammatical function it has. When reading a convoluted sentence I sometimes have to read it three times before I figure out what is the subject and what is the verb. More commas, hyphens and brackets would sometimes help.

[gwnn]

Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana.

[barmar]

 gwnn, on 2015-July-14, 07:54, said:

Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana.

And:

Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.