A message from me, Dave, to people who post anywhere on the internet

[Godless Dave]

The past tense of "lead" is "led".

Thank you.

[MonCapitan2002]

I know I am going to regret finding out the answer to this, but I have to know. What are they using instead?

[Godless Dave]

"lead"

[Petra]

It wasn't me, was it? :shiftier:

[Miisa]

I didn't do, nobody saw me do it!

[Megatron]

Also, there is no "E" in "Lightning"

"Their" describes something that belongs to more than one person or entity. *It's their property*

"There" describes a location. *Points over there*

"They're" is a contraction for "They are". *They're having a barbecue*

[Petra]

And "writing" only has one "t".

:yup:

[Megatron]

Oh, one of my personal favorites:

"You're" is a contraction for "You are" *You're reading this...*
"Your" describes something that belongs to you. *...on your computer*

[BracesForImpact]

The past tense of "lead" is "led".

While this is true, it is not the most annoying screw up I've seen.

There is one that simply annoys me to no end. I think it's mostly because I've seen people a hell of a lot more educated than myself make this error and damn it, they should know better.

One can have loose change in their pocket.

But if you lose it, you have misplaced it.

Got it?

Now, fucking stop that shit!

http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e287/ronjrose/grammarnazi-sm.jpg

[Godless Dave]

I hate that one too, but I've been seeing the "lead" thing an awful lot recently, mostly at livejournal but also in Wikipedia articles.

[Crumb]

At times I have made all of these mistakes. Not because I don't know better, but because I don't have the time to proofread as thoroughly as all y'all. :wink:

Relax, have a pill. :chillpill:

[viscousmemories]

The past tense of "lead" is "led".
I confess, I've been confused about this since I was a kid. 'Led' has always seemed more appropriate for the past tense* of lead than 'lead' when I'm writing, but I swear I've seen the latter written so often that I wasn't sure it was wrong.

I'm sure part of the problem is that the lead (the metal) is pronounced 'led'.


*Speaking of confusing terms, I'm always unsure of whether "past tense" is 'pasttense', 'pastense', 'past-tense', etc.

[SharonDee]

I'm sure part of the problem is that the lead (the metal) is pronounced 'led'.I've also blamed the usage "read/read" for this tendency to use "lead/lead".

[Shake]

Also just a friendly reminder that "to" does not mean "also". That would be "too".

[D. Scarlatti]

I could care less.

[LadyShea]

Someone who is not telling the truth is lying.

[Crumb]

unless they are standing or sitting.

[Dingfod]

Someone who is not telling the truth is lying.:thumbsup:

[Kevlar]

I to was lead to believe that lieing around and typing on the computer would improve you're writting skills, instead I am loosing them.

[LadyShea]

NC, it's spelled lieing ;)

[Kevlar]

NC, it's spelled lieing ;)

Dammit, I can't even misspell correctly

[Jet Black]

I hate that one too, but I've been seeing the "lead" thing an awful lot recently, mostly at livejournal but also in Wikipedia articles.

unfortunately, fuckups are infectious. I doubt many people know what an apostrophe is for anymore, other than randomly jamming into a word.

[wei yau]

Oh and if there are any Star Wars fanboy geeks on the Internet....

It's not Emporer. It's Emperor.

[Godless Dave]

I to was lead to believe that lieing around and typing on the computer would improve you're writting skills, instead I am loosing them.

Dont worry, us grammer nazi's are at you're beckon call.

[Jet Black]

I to was lead to believe that lieing around and typing on the computer would improve you're writting skills, instead I am loosing them.

Dont worry, us grammer nazi's are at you're beckon call.

they should of known to practise there english at school.

(replacing have with of is the one I hate most)

[Plant Woman]

My most common mistakes are:

to many instead of too many

there instead of their or the other way around

your instead of you're or the other way around.

I know all those by heart, yet manage to not use them correctly.

But that is only when I am writing posts. I am much more casual and definately not careful about grammar and punctuation. When I write articles I have a copy editor that corrects my mistakes and the biggest problem is not using commas enough. The above problems are very rare; however, in a sentence such as this, I usually forget the semi-colon and use a comma instead.

[pescifish]

I always think its nice too meat someone I know on the street. :innocent2:



That was sooooo not cheating, honest.

:pescmeat:

[Godwhacker]

So I guess the band was referring to a Zeppelin that was Led around? :P

[cappuccino]

I usually don't get fazed when people make silly grammar mistakes but for some reason this particular mistake annoys the hell out of me, it must be a phase I'm going through. :P

[Perry]

A bit OCD. Mine is this: pencils don't have lead! It's graphite! Get it through your fucking head!

[MonCapitan2002]

Oh, one of my personal favorites:

"You're" is a contraction for "You are" *You're reading this...*
"Your" describes something that belongs to you. *...on your computer*
I despise it when those two get mixed up. It annoys me whenever I see it.

[pescifish]

Get it through your fucking head! Ouch!

/me has a piece of lea... erm... graphite stuck in the palm of her hand because she didn't want to use the pointy side while pounding said pencil into her sister's head during a long car ride.

[Puck]

Goodness Dave, you really need to come down for the party, and chill out.

Your far two tents. :D

[JoeP]

I hate this: alot

[viscousmemories]

I used alot a lot until my late 20's, oblivious to its wrongness. It's with no small amount of shame that I admit that I was also confused about 'its' and 'it's' until very recently, because I thought that if we were to refer to Marcie's dog we would describe Marcie as it's owner.

Lately I've found myself stumped by 'in to' vs. 'into' a lot. I leaned over to tie my shoe, and bashed my head in to (into?) the countertop. I blame this confusion on working with computer networks, where one uses their login name to log in to the network. If you log in to the network, shouldn't you walk in to the house?

Actually just typing that out made me realize the difference! "In to" is for entering, and "into" is for coming into contact with. I think. :chin:

[JoeP]

Hereinafter I will loginto the network. Notalot.

[Chatter]

I used alot a lot until my late 20's, oblivious to its wrongness. It's with no small amount of shame that I admit that I was also confused about 'its' and 'it's' until very recently, because I thought that if we were to refer to Marcie's dog we would describe Marcie as it's owner.That's pretty shameful, and my estimation of you has now dropped significantly.

Lately I've found myself stumped by 'in to' vs. 'into' a lot. I leaned over to tie my shoe, and bashed my head in to (into?) the countertop. I blame this confusion on working with computer networks, where one uses their login name to log in to the network. If you log in to the network, shouldn't you walk in to the house?I think "log in to the network" is different. According to Merriam-Webster, "log in" is a transitive verb, so it has to be separate from "to the network" in that sentence.

Actually just typing that out made me realize the difference! "In to" is for entering, and "into" is for coming into contact with. I think. :chin:But you acknowledge that "Walk into the house" is correct even though it is about entering.

I had been spelling it "athiest" until recently.

[viscousmemories]

But you acknowledge that "Walk into the house" is correct even though it is about entering.
I don't, though. When I see it written it occurs to me that if one walked into the house, he/she'd get a broken nose!

Hmm... tfd.com disagrees with me, and says "into the house" is correct. :(

[BracesForImpact]

...I was also confused about 'its' and 'it's'...

I have that problem too. I also tend to use too many commas.

[Anastasia Beaverhausen]

they should of known to practise there english at school.


:whup:

Rouge is a color. A rogue is a person.

[Chatter]

But you acknowledge that "Walk into the house" is correct even though it is about entering.
I don't, though. When I see it written it occurs to me that if one walked into the house, he/she'd get a broken nose!I guess the assumption is that the person would use the door. On the other hand, if I said "I walked into a brick wall" that would be different.

As I understand it, when the two words are separate, "in" is a particle or adverb, so that "walk in", "log in", "step in" are complete verb phrases. In these cases, "to" is either a preposition ("I gave in to them") or forms an infinitive "I walked in to see the doctor".

I'm still puzzling over "walk in to the house" though. What if I were to write "Instead of running in, I walked in to the house." If that second sentence is correct, then it seems "I walked in to the house" would also be acceptable.

[MonCapitan2002]

I to was lead to believe that lieing around and typing on the computer would improve you're writting skills, instead I am loosing them.

Dont worry, us grammer nazi's are at you're beckon call.

they should of known to practise there english at school.

(replacing have with of is the one I hate most)
I absolutely despise that one myself. Whenever I see it, I get the urge to them stupid fucks for writing it like that. If I were a message board administrator, I'd be sorely tempted to use the ban button on such people.

[maddog]

"in to" and "into" is most obviously wrong to me when people write, "The driver turned into the police station." He DID? WOW! I'd sure like to see THAT trick!

#748

[viscousmemories]

I also tend to use too many commas.
I've had a lot of people tell me I use commas in an interesting (read: unusual) fashion, but as much as I'd like to take credit being creative I've only ever tried to use them correctly. Which is to say I've inserted them where I would normally pause in speech (which is the rule as I understand it), but I think I have an unusual speech pattern.

[Godless Dave]

It's with no small amount of shame that I admit that I was also confused about 'its' and 'it's' until very recently, because I thought that if we were to refer to Marcie's dog we would describe Marcie as it's owner.

The missing apostrophe in "its" is totally arbitrary. It comes from the curious phenomenon of using an apostrophe to mark possession, even though "Marcie's" is not a contraction of anything. That's what we get for getting rid of the genitive case. You don't hear English grammarians talk about "case" much, but it's lurking under the surface of English. I didn't start to recognize English cases until I took German.

[Stormlight]

I could care less.


:bow:

[Julie]

My problem Is () I'm for ever typeing like I think, Which is usually 4-5 thoughts at a time. Sometimes I end up putting brackets within barckets.

It's why I don't write much. I can never get just one thought down at a time. I come across a lot less intelligent in written form that I do in real life. Whin I write I sound like a bubble head.

My spelling on the other hand is wonderful. I spell everthing correctly... It's everyone else in the world that can't spell ;)

[Sock Puppet]

The missing apostrophe in "its" is totally arbitrary. It comes from the curious phenomenon of using an apostrophe to mark possession, even though "Marcie's" is not a contraction of anything.
Really? I thought it was because the possessive neuter pronoun just happens to have an 's' on the end, but is otherwise just the same as "his" and "her."

[Perry]

i dont really say that to people. it just amazes me that people dont know their basic elements.

writing in lower case either means
a. you are cool because youre spontaneous (in a conformist way) and have more important things to do because youre having so much fun in life, or
b. you are a free-thinking rebel who is not bound by societal conventions, or
c. sending a quick note, or
d. just really lazy.

[Dingfod]

A bit OCD. Mine is this: pencils don't have lead! It's graphite! Get it through your fucking head!We've been calling it pencil lead (http://science.howstuffworks.com/question465.htm) for a long long time. Get over it. Pencil graphite just doesn't sound right at all, nor is it entirely accurate. Pencil leads are made of clay mixed with ground up graphite.

[Dingfod]

i dont really say that to people. it just amazes me that people dont know their basic elements.

writing in lower case either means
a. you are cool because youre spontaneous (in a conformist way) and have more important things to do because youre having so much fun in life, or
b. you are a free-thinking rebel who is not bound by societal conventions, or
c. sending a quick note, or
d. just really lazy.I'm thinking: d.

[Megatron]

Rouge is a color. A rogue is a person.Thank you. This one drives us all nuts on the World of Warcraft forums.

[Blake]

It's with no small amount of shame that I admit that I was also confused about 'its' and 'it's' until very recently, because I thought that if we were to refer to Marcie's dog we would describe Marcie as it's owner.You're still confused. :D

My jump on this bandwagon is "tenants" in place of "tenets." All--the--fucking--time. Stop!

[viscousmemories]

You're still confused. :D
That was illustrative. :wink:

[Perry]

The only part that irritates me is that people get worried and think it's poisonous.

A bit OCD. Mine is this: pencils don't have lead! It's graphite! Get it through your fucking head!We've been calling it pencil lead (http://science.howstuffworks.com/question465.htm) for a long long time. Get over it. Pencil graphite just doesn't sound right at all, nor is it entirely accurate. Pencil leads are made of clay mixed with ground up graphite.

[Blake]

That was illustrative. :wink:Damn your subtlety.

[Dingfod]

The only part that irritates me is that people get worried and think it's poisonous.I hope it's not, I've got a permanent graphite tattoo in the palm of my left hand where I was stabbed by a pencil when I was in high school some 30 odd years ago.

[Clutch Munny]

Well, I think I've complained about "equally as" before.

Correct: x is as F as y.
Correct: x and y are equally F.
Popular, nonsensical and grating: x is equally as F as y.
Popular, nonsensical and grating: x and y are equally as F.

[But]

"Ad nauseum". I cringe every time I read it. What's up with that?

[livius drusus]

Is that where they house puke collections?