Rock your boat, chair, or cradle

but please "wear" your clothes, "pass" your test, and "play" your musical instrument. Thank you.

I mean, rock on.

These fine examples is from just today

media

[mee-dee-uh] 

–noun

pl. of medium.

(used with a plural verb ) the means of communication, as radio and television, newspapers, and magazines, that reach or influence people widely: The media are covering the speech tonight.

 

 

Common sense is an oxymoron, you butt head

So are these:

• act naturally
• advanced BASIC
• almost exactly
• alone together
• authentically reproduced
• canned/frozen fresh
• center around
• clearly misunderstood
• click "start" to shut down  
• constant change
• crash landing
• deafening silence
• decreased growth
• definite maybe
• even odds
• exact estimate
• first annual (one of my pet peeves)
• found missing/turned up missing
• free trade
• freezer burn
• go ahead/back up
• good grief
• government organization
• Great Depression
• Hell’s Angels
• holy war
• hot chili
• jumbo shrimp
• larger half
• last initial
• little giant
• living dead
• long shorts
• military intelligence
• near miss
• old news
• one of the only
• original copy
• passive aggressive
• peace force
• peacekeeper missile
• plastic glasses
• political science
• pretty ugly
• resident alien
• rolling stop
• same difference
• sanitary landfill
• seriously funny
• silent alarm
• small crowd
• soft rock
• student teacher  
• sweet tart
• synthetic natural gas
• taped live
• temporary tax increase
• terribly pleased
• tight slacks
• to infinity and beyond
• unbiased opinion
• virtual reality
• working vacation

This ad gave me déjà vu all over again

"Irregardless" of what you think, "humorous redundancy" is an oxymoron. During a particularly frustrating grading marathon a few years ago, I began logging the circumlocution I found and stopped being amused by it. (Or should I say ceased and desisted?) Here are some common culprits:

• 12 midnight/12 noon
• added bonus
• advance planning/advance warning
• all over again
• ask for by name
• ATM machine
• awkward predicament
• basic fundamentals 
• close proximity
• complete stop
• difficult dilemma
• end result
• estimated roughly
•  filled to capacity
• first and foremost
• free gift 
• frozen ice
• general public
• illegal discrimination
• input into 
• join together 
• kill dead 
• little baby
•  live studio audience
• meet together
• natural instinct
• never at any time
• null and void
• over and done with
• overexaggerate
• pair of twins
• past experience/past history
• PIN number/VIN number
• plan ahead/preplan
• poisonous venom
•  reason why
• refer back
• regular routine
• same exact
• suddenly exploded
• unexpected surprise
• very pregnant
• very unique

If you're not part of the solution, you might be a news anchor

After the shooting of 19 people at a Tucson political rally last week, Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives, FOX and CNN alike blamed "vitriolic rhetoric" for the tragedy. Since then, news anchors and analysts have reported, repeated, and vilified every gun-related analogy ever used by Sarah Palin or Barack Obama. Today one of our oblivious local media personalities immediately followed one such diatribe with a story about campaign finance reports, which she called (I am not making this up) "politicians' war chests." Sigh.

WWJ(ayZ)D about Huck Finn?

Marguerite Henry's Geraldine Belinda (1942) was my favorite book when I was a little girl. It was beautifully illustrated by Gladys Rourke Blackwood. Its fine moral lesson was about snobbery, sharing, and forgiveness. Its protagonist had pigtails like mine (and a muff like I always wanted), and its red cover was my favorite color. But when I unpacked it in the early 1980s for my firstborn, who was beginning to read, I realized it was also politically incorrect. Having studied Uncle Tom's Cabin sometime in the interim between 1960 and 1980, I now recognized Geraldine's Topsy doll as a derogatory stereotype rather than the 1940s equivalent of my Tiny Tears or my daughter's Strawberry Shortcake. My first inclination was to put the book back in storage, but I used it instead to create a teachable moment. Over the years, literature provided me many more teachable moments about race, religion, gender, and other issues of tolerance and inclusion.

How will today's and tomorrow's children learn history--learn FROM history--if we sanitize books like Huckleberry Finn to reflect society's current mores rather than the values of their authors and the periods during which they were written? Even Oprah, on today's MLK tribute show, told her audience she now understands why (and how) Jay Z uses the n-word. Let's accord Mark Twain the same insight.

Spellcheck for cake decorators?



Most people who mangle this go with "congradulations," so at least it's original!



Slow Children Crossing

My daughter's childhood friend Sarah May Silva recently posted an amusing facebook status message that soared over the heads of most of her readers: Is it "A woman without her man is nothing" or "A woman: without her, man is nothing"? I gave her an lol, but the rest of her commenters went off on feminist rants. Are Sarah and Alanis Morissette the only members of their generation who "get" irony, or did schools stop teaching punctuation in the '80s? I fear both to be true, but this blog isn't about the demise of subtle humor, so let's ponder commas--missing, misplaced, and superfluous.

Before teaching their punctuation unit, I always ask my developmental English students, "How many of you learned in elementary school to put a comma in your sentence wherever you would pause while speaking the same words?" They ALL did, and that's the only "rule" most of them EVER learned! So those who speak like every conversation is a filibuster use no commas, while those who hem and haw sprinkle them like pepper over their compositions. But in series? After introductory phrases? Around asides or appositives? Before coordinating conjunctions in compound sentences? After dependent clauses? With nonrestrictive clauses? Most would be more successful defusing a bomb or clearing a minefield blindfolded!

Teaching grown-ups to use punctuation correctly is challenging for instructors and frustrating for their adult students, who must first "unlearn" decades of bad habits. If I had a million dollars, I'd send all current fourth graders the kids' version of Eats, Shoots & Leaves (right) and all their parents--and teachers--the original book (scrollbar below). What would you do?

You'll pay later ...

My friend and mentor John Banusiewicz, managing editor for the Department of Defense, celebrates superfluous punctuation every Friday, and food vendors seem to dominate his end-of-week facebook wall of shame. Among the signs he's collected are some doosies: "PIZZA" BY THE SLICE makes me wonder what the eatery is really serving. I'll not be shopping at any deli that warns OUR FRIED FOODS MAY HAVE BEEN COOKED IN "SOY OIL." And for many reasons I'll detour blocks around the market that posts "PARENTS" You are Responsible For your "Childrens" (SAFETY) Do not let them Run "Free" or "Leave" them "Unattended" "In Shopping Carts" While Shopping. Management Thank You

Visit the "blog" of "unnecessary" quotation marks for additional chuckles and/or frustration.

You can't proofread your 1x2 ad? Really?

Facebook's sidebar is such a target-rich environment that it may be unfair to pick on its advertisers, but these gems come from universities, so no mercy: I would question the qualifications of any teacher who earned an MS Ed at a school that capitalizes "Online" but not "english" (left), and I would worry about the leadership skills of 140+ generals and admirals who were apparently never taught the difference between "over" and "more than" (right).

"I will never need spelling because I'm going into the family construction business"

  In the very next block I saw an AXEL FOR SALE $40 sign.

Every community college English instructor has heard the same complaint from future mechanics, future nurses, and even future criminals: "I'm never going to use this stuff. Why do I have to take composition? It's a waste of my time and money." Sigh. I show the future mechanics incoherent work orders and ask how many comebacks they think the designated technician will have to absorb while guessing what needs to be repaired. I show the future nurses incoherent patient charts and ask how confident they think a caretaker will be administering the medication and/or treatment seemingly indicated. I even show the budding felons incoherent jail requisition forms and ask how soon they think the petitioning inmate will get his phone call or postage stamp. What would you tell them?