Posted on 11/19/2002 7:39:06 AM PST by EggsAckley
"There, their, my child," cooed the old school marm. "Your all right. It's just so easy to mix words up in yore mind.""You see, a lot of them sound alike, and are even related in meaning. But if your ever going to be a good writer, you'll have to learn the difference. Their three different words, you see, and they'res really a difference." "When you hear them, theirs a chance you can't tell the difference, but if you write them, you're readers will be confused by what you mean, if your using the wrong one."
"Their are times when you want to say long ago, and that word is yore. And then they're are times you want to say you are, and that word is you're. And what does that leave? Your means belonging to you."
"But that's not all; when you want to say belonging to them, the word is their, and when you want to say that place, the word is there."
"And finally, they're means they are."
"Any questions?"
I hate the their/there/they're, it's/its, your/you're, lose/loose thing myself. It probably comes from being the son of a published novelist.
Of course, this does nothing for this problem. I first encountered it years ago when I got a solicitation letter offering to come to my work 'cite'. As an old f**t, I'm sure that it is not unusual to view the trends with alarm, but since I've felt this way for 30+ years, I wonder if I'm calling for the tide to receed. While it has not been the "King's English" for centuries, must we be so careless with what we have got?!
The European Union commissioners have announced that agreement has been reached to adopt English as the preferred language for European communications, rather than German, which was the other possibility.
As part of the negotiations, Her Majesty's Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a five-year phased plan for what will be known as EuroEnglish (Euro for short).
In the first year, 's' will be used instead of the soft 'c'. Sertainly, sivil servants will resieve this news with joy. Also, the hard 'c' will be replaced with 'k.' Not only will this klear up konfusion, but typewriters kan have one less letter.
There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome 'ph' will be replaced by 'f'. This will make words like 'fotograf' 20 per sent shorter. In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible.
Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of silent 'e's in the languag is disgrasful, and they would go. By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing 'th' by 'z' and 'W' by 'V'. During ze fifz year, ze unesesary 'o' kan be dropd from vords kontaining 'ou', and similar changes vud of kors; be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters. After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil b no mor trubls or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi tu understand ech ozer.
Ze drem vil finali kum tru.
Credit to:McRae Clan Home Page
I admit to wincing a little bit when I see such illiteracy or carelessness but, maybe you need some time off. ;-)
Oh, and the latest peeve I have is with people using "can not" instead of "cannot." (Idiots! ;-D)
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