Apostrophe crimes

[Alex Bridgeman]

While I will concede that I should have used an apostrophe for "the five attendees glasses", I will not concede that the sadness was excessive. If any emotion should be attached to the sadness, it should be described as satisfied sadness.

[jdaw1]

The extra sadness was for the missed apostrophe, that’s all.

[jdaw1]

I have very little experiance on this part of vintage port.Apart from the Symingtons and the other big hitters,Which is your top three of the smaller not so well known Quinta's that are consistently making good port.

[jdaw1]

This time I'm definitely going to porto, assuming its the right plane!

[jdaw1]

So at least we are agreed its toms fault!

[KillerB]

This time I'm definitely going to porto, assuming its the right plane!

Yeah, but at least he spelt "definitely" correctly.

[jdaw1]

Usually I exempt Conky from Apostrophe Crimes (well, it might be more accurate to say “sometimes†), but to omit an apostrophe in the title of a thread (Newcomers....Dont be afraid of the Geeks!) is just too much. (Alan: Newcomers: Don’t be afraid of the Geeks! might have been better.)

[jdaw1]

G-man: repeat offender on whom I have been too soft.

adding to julians' 63 and 75, the 47?

[KillerB]

G-man: repeat offender on whom I have been too soft.

adding to julians' 63 and 75, the 47?

Are you assuming there is only one Julian? Scrub that.

Anyway, G-Man assures me that his native tongue is Taiwanese and you are not allowed Apostrophe Crimes on non-native speakers.

[DRT]

G-man: repeat offender on whom I have been too soft.

adding to julians' 63 and 75, the 47?

Are you assuming there is only one Julian? Scrub that.

Anyway, G-Man assures me that his native tongue is Taiwanese and you are not allowed Apostrophe Crimes on non-native speakers.

Agreed.

[jdaw1]

Anyway, G-Man assures me that his native tongue is Taiwanese and you are not allowed Apostrophe Crimes on non-native speakers.

1. Apologies: my understanding was that G-man had been speaking English from an age sufficiently young to be eligible for this thread.

2. Taiwanese?! Do you really mean Min Nan rather than Mandarin? Cool.

[KillerB]

Anyway, G-Man assures me that his native tongue is Taiwanese and you are not allowed Apostrophe Crimes on non-native speakers.

1. Apologies: my understanding was that G-man had been speaking English from an age sufficiently young to be eligible for this thread.

2. Taiwanese?! Do you really mean Min Nan rather than Mandarin? Cool.

Can't remember. G-man? BTW, remember that I am protecting you from months of on-line grammatical abuse. Whatever you do, do not admit to being born in New Jersey.

[jdaw1]

months of on-line grammatical abuse

Commendation for careful phrasing. The abuse would be, of course, grammatical. But on the subject of punctuation.

[jdaw1]

enough fruity scrumptiousness to be wiped out in it's youth.

[jdaw1]

to ensure AHBs kitchen floor remains uninhabited

… to ensure that AHB’s kitchen …

I’m grateful that you didn’t say “insure†, which would have been still more heinous.

[DRT]

to ensure AHBs kitchen floor remains uninhabited

… to ensure that AHB’s kitchen …

I’m grateful that you didn’t say “insure†, which would have been still more heinous.

Firstly, "that" isn't an apostrophe and therefore should not be reported here as a crime.

Secondly, AHBs and AHB's are equally valid, as you once explained to me.

Are you having a bad day?

Derek

[KillerB]

to ensure AHBs kitchen floor remains uninhabited

… to ensure that AHB’s kitchen …

Firstly, "that" isn't an apostrophe and therefore should not be reported here as a crime.

Secondly, AHBs and AHB's are equally valid, as you once explained to me.

Are you having a bad day?

Derek

No they are not. The kitchen (and its floor) belongs to AHB, therefore it is AHB's kitchen and requires a possessive apostrophe. There are few occasions when the apostrophe is optional and this is not one of them. Whatever jdaw1's explanation it would not have meant this, unless he has some strange tiddly-winks club (no apostrophe required here, the club does not belong to tiddly-winks) definition that only he understands.

However, the 'that' is implied and should not be included as a crime, let alone an apostrophe crime. Only an extreme pedant would...

[DRT]

the 'that' is implied and should not be included as a crime, let alone an apostrophe crime. Only an extreme pedant would...

[jdaw1]

Only an extreme pedant would...

… notice the use of three dots (“...†) rather than an ellipsis (“…†)?

"that"

Why the bolded quotation marks? Accidentally put inside the quoted text’s bolding? OK, it happens.

[jdaw1]

older one's that I haven't researched

[DRT]

older one's that I haven't researched

Damn! I had been doing quite well with my apostrophe's recently and now I've gone and blown it.

[jdaw1]

[edit to remove an offending apostrophe…]

I was too slow. But commendation for use of the ellipsis character (“…†), rather than three dots (“...†).

[jdaw1]

Some [car rental] agencies may also have a minimum age for rental or a surcharge for driver's under the age of 25.

[jdaw1]

Enter the infants full name as it appears on the travel document.

[benread]

Enter the infants full name as it appears on the travel document.

Are you flying continental by any chance?!

[JacobH]

[edit to remove an offending apostrophe…]

I was too slow. But commendation for use of the ellipsis character (“…†), rather than three dots (“...†).

I’m fairly sure I was the only person on-line at that point, so I think this should be scratched, in order to encourage others to correct their mistakes

Also, should we not have a meta-crime for the prevailing use of the prime (') over the apostrophe (’)?

-Jacob

[KillerB]

[edit to remove an offending apostrophe…]

I was too slow. But commendation for use of the ellipsis character (“…†), rather than three dots (“...†).

I’m fairly sure I was the only person on-line at that point, so I think this should be scratched, in order to encourage others to correct their mistakes

Also, should we not have a meta-crime for the prevailing use of the prime (') over the apostrophe (’)?

-Jacob

No - stop turning into Julian's Mini-me.

[JacobH]

[edit to remove an offending apostrophe…]

I was too slow. But commendation for use of the ellipsis character (“…†), rather than three dots (“...†).

I’m fairly sure I was the only person on-line at that point, so I think this should be scratched, in order to encourage others to correct their mistakes

Also, should we not have a meta-crime for the prevailing use of the prime (') over the apostrophe (’)?

-Jacob

No - stop turning into Julian's Mini-me.

I did have a solicitation to that effect, but I’m more a “use the correct character† pedant rather than a †put it in the right place† one

[KillerB]

[edit to remove an offending apostrophe…]

I was too slow. But commendation for use of the ellipsis character (“…†), rather than three dots (“...†).

I’m fairly sure I was the only person on-line at that point, so I think this should be scratched, in order to encourage others to correct their mistakes

Also, should we not have a meta-crime for the prevailing use of the prime (') over the apostrophe (’)?

-Jacob

No - stop turning into Julian's Mini-me.

I did have a solicitation to that effect, but I’m more a “use the correct character† pedant rather than a †put it in the right place† one

Julian does that as well - it's a slippery slope.

[Alex Bridgeman]

I did have a solicitation to that effect, but I’m more a “use the correct character† pedant rather than a †put it in the right place† one

I suspect that you`re also a Mac user. If there´s a way for me to easily use an apostrophe rather than a prime via a Windows keyboard, I've yet to find it¡

[JacobH]

I suspect that you`re also a Mac user. If there´s a way for me to easily use an apostrophe rather than a prime via a Windows keyboard, I've yet to find it¡

It’s actually much worse than that; I switched to Debian a few years ago (though one advantage is that it is very easy to set custom layouts). Anyway, it’s a while since I’ve done this on windows, but I thought the left and right single quotation marks could be achieved by setting your keyboard layout to US-International and then using using Atl-Gr and 9 or 0? If I remember correctly, though, it’s almost impossible to manually generate double ones without lots of messing around.

[KillerB]

I did have a solicitation to that effect, but I’m more a “use the correct character† pedant rather than a †put it in the right place† one

I suspect that you`re also a Mac user. If there´s a way for me to easily use an apostrophe rather than a prime via a Windows keyboard, I've yet to find it¡

Very cute Alex, but I suspect that most people will miss it, hence the pointlessness of it all (not life, the apostrophe thingy).

[jdaw1]

I did have a solicitation to that effect, but I’m more a “use the correct character† pedant rather than a †put it in the right place† one

I suspect that you`re also a Mac user. If there´s a way for me to easily use an apostrophe rather than a prime via a Windows keyboard, I've yet to find it¡

Alt-0145, Alt-0146, Alt-0147, Alt-0148.

I am also lightly questioning this use of the word “prime†. Surely the prime characters are those in “6′2″†, rather than the non-directional quotation marks?

[JacobH]

I am also lightly questioning this use of the word “prime†. Surely the prime characters are those in “6′2″†, rather than the non-directional quotation marks?

Fair enough: I have never been very good at remembering the names of those dubious ASCII legacy characters. However, neither is Unicode, who name U+0027 (') “apostrophe† and U+0022 (") “quotation mark†.

[JacobH]

Founded in 1670, Warre's is the oldest British Port House and is owned by the Symington family, Port producers since the 19th century and who's ancestor made one of the first…

Despite what KillerB might think, I have quite a lot of sympathy for people who make grammatical typos on forum threads. It’s things that make it into print for which I have less time. Especially when, like this, they use straight rather than curly apostrophes and quotation marks throughout.

-Jacob

[jdaw1]

Undoubtedly the best drinking wine of the night - but it wasn't it's night

[DRT]

Undoubtedly the best drinking wine of the night - but it wasn't it's night

I typed, deleted, typed, deleted and typed again. If the night doesn't belong to "it" who does it belong to?

[jdaw1]

Oh dear: “it’s† means “it is†; “it’s† is not possessive.

[DRT]

Oh dear: “it’s† means “it is†; “it’s† is not possessive.

So the possessive form of 'it' is 'its'?

[jdaw1]

So the possessive form of 'it' is 'its'?

Yes. Try this simple quiz to verify mastery of the skill.

[DRT]

So the possessive form of 'it' is 'its'?

Yes. Try this simple quiz to verify mastery of the skill.

100% - 10 out of 10 - Top Marks

Its probably time for me to go to the top of the class

[jdaw1]

100% - 10 out of 10 - Top Marks

Top equal, I’m quite sure.

[jdaw1]

its almost impossible to get everything perfect

Including one’s apostrophes.

[Andy Velebil]

its almost impossible to get everything perfect

Including one’s apostrophes.

Whatch ja want?

after having a brand new trainee at work the past couple of days, I am so tired of making spelling corrects, I really didnt care to double check

[jdaw1]

to double check

Yes, avoiding that split infinitive is awkward. The likes of “to check doubly†, or even “to check twice†, have a quite different tone and sense. And using a hyphen to make a compound verb (“to double-check†) can alienate the reader by appearing overly pedantic. So I don’t wholly disagree with your choice.

[jdaw1]

we need to update the first thread with what bottles the other attendee's are bringing.

[Andy Velebil]

[DRT]

I have been away for 10+ days and am hugely disappointed that the 4 posts immediately above this one are the only contributions to MD during my absence. Are you guys trying to tell me something

[jdaw1]

A few early contenders based on last nights form then!

[jdaw1]

The S-band erectable antenna will be deployed to increase the communications capability. It's major impact to the EVA is in obtaining an equivalent communications capability that will be possible only if a 210-foot antenna is in view.

Also annoying me was ¶3.1.2’s insure/ensure confusion: “Additionally, the frequent rest periods within the timeline add to this conservatism and insure that each crewman and his PLSS remain in a nominal operating condition.†

Given such sloppiness it’s amazing that they made it there and back.