Palinized …

Today on Today, NBC TV host Matt Lauer asked Congresswoman and GOP candidate Michele Bachmann the following:

“Amy Kremer, who’s a leader of the Tea Party movement, said … that you will be – and this is her word, not mine – quote, ‘Palinized’ in this campaign. Do you understand the verb, and what would your definition of it be?”  

Click on the photo to see the video segment:

All politics aside, thank you Mr. Lauer for furthering our cause … especially in the “Verbalized …” category. This might just start a new sub-category: “Verbalized … Properly” (verbalized with a proper noun). Stay tuned.

See our series on Nouns gone bad:

• Nouns gone bad …
• Nouns gone bad … sequeled
• Nouns gone bad … Properly
• Badverbs … cousins to nouns gone bad
• Verbalized …
• SPAM: honorary noun gone bad …
• Yummy noun gone bad …

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Syn Tax …

A faithful reader shared this with us. We couldn’t resist sharing it with you … enjoy!

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Apostrophe amusement …

Candidates for the therapy of  GRAMMARHOLICS (not so) ANONYMOUS … ? Virtual meetings are available regularly!

Be sure to visit our friends over at Apostrophe Abuse, Apostrophe Catastrophes, Apostrophism, and, of course, Apostrophe Police, …

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Another noun gone bad …

Oh my … really? What is our language coming to?

See our series on Nouns gone bad:

• Nouns gone bad …
• Nouns gone bad … sequeled
• Nouns gone bad … Properly
• Badverbs … cousins to nouns gone bad
• Verbalized …
• SPAM: honorary noun gone bad …
• Yummy noun gone bad …

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Stealth supplies …

One of our favorite things to do is shop for office supplies. Imagine our delight at finding this entry in the OfficeMax catalog:

OfficeMax Invisible Tape Dispensers

Are these as as out-of-sight as the OfficeMax Invisible Boxed Tape  that goes in the invisible dispenser?  We just couldn’t see our way clear to order one. Maybe these stealth supplies would make for a very clean desk?

In case you don’t get it, consider these alternatives:

OfficeMax Dispensers for Invisible Tape, and OfficeMax Boxed Invisible Tape. This way, the reader will know that it’s the tape that is invisible, not the dispenser or the box.

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What’s in a sign …

… not always perfect grammar. As we found in these hilarious examples of signs around the world. Enjoy!

In a washroom:
TOILET OUT OF ORDER. PLEASE USE FLOOR BELOW

In a Launderette:
AUTOMATIC WASHING MACHINES: PLEASE REMOVE ALL YOUR CLOTHES WHEN THE LIGHT GOES OUT

In a London department store:
BARGAIN BASEMENT UPSTAIRS

In an office:
WOULD THE PERSON WHO TOOK THE STEP LADDER YESTERDAY PLEASE BRING IT BACK OR FURTHER STEPS WILL BE TAKEN

In an office:
AFTER TEA BREAK STAFF SHOULD EMPTY THE TEAPOT AND STAND UPSIDE DOWN ON THE DRAINING BOARD

Outside a secondhand shop:
WE EXCHANGE ANYTHING – BICYCLES, WASHING MACHINES, ETC. WHY NOT BRING YOUR WIFE ALONG AND GET A WONDERFUL BARGAIN?

Notice in health food shop window:
CLOSED DUE TO ILLNESS

Spotted in a safari park:
ELEPHANTS PLEASE STAY IN YOUR CAR

Sign on a wall at a conference:
FOR ANYONE WHO HAS CHILDREN AND DOESN’T KNOW IT, THERE IS A DAY CARE ON THE 1ST FLOOR

Notice in a farmer’s field:
THE FARMER ALLOWS WALKERS TO CROSS THE FIELD FOR FREE, BUT THE BULL CHARGES.

Message on a leaflet:
IF YOU CANNOT READ THEN THIS LEAFLET WILL TELL YOU HOW TO GET READING LESSONS

On a repair shop door:
WE CAN REPAIR ANYTHING. (PLEASE KNOCK HARD ON THE DOOR – THE BELL DOESN’T WORK)

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Giants of idioms …

In honor of the 2010 World Series (and the fact that we love the outcome) … we present the “Giants of Idioms:”

 

 

English language idioms derived from baseball

 

B
ballpark: in the ballpark, ballpark figure, and out of the ballpark
batting 1000 or batting a thousand
big league(s)
brush back
bush-league
C
cat bird seat, cat-bird seat or catbird seat
Charley horse
cleanup hitter
cover one’s bases; cover all the bases
curve, curveball
D
double header
down to the last out
ducks on a pond
E
extra innings
F
foot in the bucket
G
grand slam
ground ball
H
hardball, play hardball
heavy hitter
hit it out of the park or knock it out of the park
hit or miss
home run
I
inside baseball
“It ain’t over till it’s all over.”
“It’s like déjà vu all over again!”
K
knock the cover off the ball
L
late innings
leadoff hitter
left field
M
major league
Mendoza line
N
ninth inning
O
o-fer
off base
on deck
one base at a time
out of left field
P
pinch hit
pitch a shutout
play ball
play softball
R
rain check
rhubarb
right off the bat
S
“Say it ain’t so, Joe!”
screwball
shutout
softball
step up to the plate
strike
swing and miss
swing for the fences
switch-hitter
T
take cuts at someone
three strikes law
took the collar
touch base
W
wheelhouse
whiff
whole new ball game; brand new ball game; (a) whole ‘nother ball game

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GRAMMARHOLICS (not so) ANONYMOUS …

Have you been to a meeting lately?

THE TWELVE STEPS OF GRAMMARHOLICS (not so) ANONYMOUS

1. We admitted we were powerless over proper grammar—that our grammar had become unmanageable.

2. Came to believe that a grammar greater than that which we use ourselves could restore us to proper usage.

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the use of proper grammar as we learned it.

4. Made a searching and fearless oral, verbal, and written inventory of our grammar.

5. Admitted to the Grammar Police, to ourselves, and to a grammar school teacher the exact nature of our misusage.

6. Were entirely ready to have proper grammar remove all these defects of usage.

7. Humbly asked for proper grammar to remove our shortcomings.

8. Made a list of all grammar rules we had broken, and became willing to make corrections to them all.

9. Made direct corrections to such grammar rules wherever possible, except when to do so would perpetuate a miscommunication of them or others.

10. Continued to take an personal inventory of our grammar and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

11. Sought through sentence structure and punctuation to improve our conscious contact with proper grammar, as we learned it, seeking only for knowledge of grammar’s will for us and the proper usage to carry that out.

12. Having had a grammatical awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry this message to grammarholics, and to practice these principles in all our communications.

One day at a time …

Copyright © 2010 Grammar Police a.k.a. GrammarCops

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Yummy noun gone bad …

We were just having lunch, and discovered a yummy addition to our series on nouns gone bad.

Thanks to our friends at M&M’s®, we dedicate this post to fruitings everywhere … we say, as we remember the priceless line from the movie Mrs. Doubtfire, “Oh, the terrorists! They run that way. It was a run-by fruiting. I’ll get them sir. Don’t worry. Good waste of juice.” (Robin Williams as Mrs. Doubtfire sitting at the poolside bar after having thrown a piece of fruit at Stu.) But, we digress …

Here’s the newest accession to our ever-expanding list: “Strawberried” … from the new Strawberried Peanut Butter M&M’s®. OMG, they are a treat. Enjoy!

Enjoy our other posts in this series:

• Nouns gone bad …
• Nouns gone bad … sequeled
• Badverbs … cousins to nouns gone bad
• Verbalized …
• SPAM: honorary noun gone bad …
• Nouns gone bad … Properly

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Dear punctuation mark …

Write a letter to a punctuation mark … win a book!
Visit our friends over at EMDASHES to join in the fun.
We have pen in hand to correspond with the SarcMark ®
Which is your favorite?

1	Apostrophe	‘
2	Brackets	[ ] { }
3	Colon	:
4	Comma	,
5	Dash	—
6	Ellipsis	…
7	Exclamation mark/point	!
8	Full stop/period	.
9	Hyphen	–
10	Parenthesis	( )
11	Question mark	?
12	Quotation marks	“ ”
13	Semicolon	;
14	Slash/stroke/virgule	/
15	Sarcmark

While you’re at it … why not enjoy “the practice or system of using certain conventional marks or characters in writing or printing in order to separate elements and make the meaning clear, as in ending a sentence or separating clauses.”

And, pay a visit to some of our other punctuation pals:

Comma Clout

Apostrophe Abuse

The Blog of Unnecessary Quotation Marks

Apostrophe Catastrophes

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