Thread: Spell it Right

Originally Posted by Obie

Ladies and gentlemen:

I insist on good grammar and punctuation for myself. Whether a line or a long essay, I try to be as correct in my grammar and punctuation as is within my range. After all, English is our language.

No it isn't!!!

Originally Posted by LX_Emergency

No it isn't!!!

Well if it ain't it oughta be ....... ........ just kidding , just kidding as I run and duck for cover......

Spelling is easy, the question is how do you pronounce it correctly?

Originally Posted by LX_Emergency

No it isn't!!!

No, it isn't! Mine is Portuguese. But we got the point... I always try to spell everything as correctly as possible. And I try to do the same in English - because English became what Esperanto was supposed to be: a common language. However, the point is taken! And I do think that I do pretty well in English... Mind you that my English is written without any aid from a correcting gizmo.

Since we're here let me tell you all a little story. You all remember when you went to school to learn how to read and write, right? I do. And I remember that spelling mistakes were not accepted in any way. Why? Because this was the point - learn the way to express yourself. If we do not have the propper vocabulary we will never be able to express aour thoughts, our ideas and ultimately, we cannot fight for our freedom.
So... some years ago my eldest cousin (now 15 years old) was learning how to read and write. One day he came home with a text he had written at school. My aunt took a look at it and was appaled. The thing was uncompreensible. There were so many spelling mistakes that they were no longer mistakes... the kid didn't know how to write as he was supposed to.
The next day my aunt went to school and paid a visit to her son's teacher thinking that something was wrong with the kid's learning abbilities. To her amazement the teacher - if I can call her that without offending the teaching class - told her that the spelling mistakes were not a problem... because the important thing is not to learn the tools to express yourself propperly but what the kid thinks! WHAT?!!! What is a 10 year old supposed to think? Who cares about that? Is she quite MAD?! I felt like... kidnaping the little idiot (the teacher) and tie her up in my basement and force her to read Orwell's 1984 one thousand and eighty four times aloud until she realizes that without propper vocabulary one simply cannot express oneself correctly. Plus, writing is the one thing that makes what we are as a culture... Fortunately the kid got to grow up with propper schooling because the stupid idiot teacher went away at the end of the school year and the kid is quite clever and curious.
Well... this is me ranting and speaking my mind.

I hope the spelling was acceptable.

Gentlemen:

Thank you for your thoughts.

What led me to my initial post on the frequency with which I have misspelled the word eBay is an item in my book "Obie's Opus." It is about the great opera composer Rossini, who was known for his acerbic sense of humor.

Rossini marked the errors on student papers with crosses. He once sent a manuscript back to a student with few markings. "I'm so happy there are so few mistakes," the kid beamed. Looking stern, Rossini shot back, "If I had marked all the errors in the music with crosses, your score would be a cemetery."

Regards,
Obie

Originally Posted by LX_Emergency

No it isn't!!!

The people who post on this site using correct English, although English is not their first language, make me ashamed about the state of my spelling ability.

Spell checker is God sent.

I must say thank you to fpessanha for using the term 'proper' english. As Obie used the term 'good' it made me cringe slightly. Grammar and spelling, in most cases cannot be good or bad. Being that currently I do not wish to prove cases for bad spelling right now I won't.
I, usually, do not care about proper spelling. Up until fairly recent times in the history of language proper spelling was not only unnecessary, but uncommon even among the educated.

Originally Posted by deighaingeal

I must say thank you to fpessanha for using the term 'proper' english. As Obie used the term 'good' it made me cringe slightly. Grammar and spelling, in most cases cannot be good or bad. Being that currently I do not wish to prove cases for bad spelling right now I won't.
I, usually, do not care about proper spelling. Up until fairly recent times in the history of language proper spelling was not only unnecessary, but uncommon even among the educated.

This is true. If you look at the original writings of our founding fathers, in paricular Jefferson, who took great pride in education, their spelling was atrocious (did I spell that correctly?) by our standards It just wasn't important then. On the other hand, I've seen hand-written letter by a 19th century ranch hand by the name of Henry McCardy (aka Billy the Kid) and noted that the spelling, grammar and even the handwriting were impeccable.

Sadly, folks here seem to pay little, if any, attention to how the owners of PayPal spell/portray their name; it's



and please notice that only the "Y" appears in upper-case; the other letters are clearly lower-case.

Perhaps all the squinting through tiny jewelers' loupes, at even tinier scratches (real and imagined) on the bevel of a blade, have caused some of you to "lose the forest for the trees". I'm just sayin'.



Hey! smooth shaving...

PS: My family name is Horen, but it took forever to get JimmyHAD to not prepend a "w".

Originally Posted by JBHoren

Sadly, folks here seem to pay little, if any, attention to how the owners of PayPal spell/portray their name; it's



and please notice that only the "Y" appears in upper-case; the other letters are clearly lower-case.

Perhaps all the squinting through tiny jewelers' loupes, at even tinier scratches (real and imagined) on the bevel of a blade, have caused some of you to "lose the forest for the trees". I'm just sayin'.



Hey! smooth shaving...

PS: My family name is Horen, but it took forever to get JimmyHAD to not prepend a "w".

They actually spell it both as "ebaY" and "eBay" but your post gave me a good chuckle anyways.