Blog referrals the third

And it’s time for another look at what search terms have sent people to my blog.

typo eradication / jeff deck grammar / typo eradication advancement league

Alas, the quest has finished, but never fear: Jeff and TEAL continue on.

im totally into him is a correct grammar

It totally isn’t a correct grammar.

ho gauge equivalents

I officially apologize to model train enthusiasts who continue to be snookered by my use of metaphor into thinking that there will actually be anything about HO gauge in this blog.

getting photo off phone old memory card

Still not done that myself yet.

cover letter of a flight stewardess

I believe these days they’re more properly referred to as ‘flight attendants.’ If you’re old-fashioned, though, the traditional version might well include the phrase ‘coffee, tea, or me?”

pictures of someone writing

Surely this doesn’t even need a stock photo agency? Find someone, stick a pen in their hand, and voila!

grammar shame / my grammar shame

Not nice of you to refrain from sharing with the rest of us.

rejection means. .

If you don’t yet know, you will soon learn.

writing perfectly

Ha!

absolute write is stupid

Are they? I have always been rather impressed by them.

dental implants comic strip pictures

File this under ‘I sure as heck wish I knew what they expected to find.’

Now that’s a dedication I like

I’ve been listed in a few book dedications – I used that verb deliberately, as they’re generally mentions in relation to mailing lists where quite a few people contributed. I’m always thrilled, of course, and waylay the nearest person so I can shriek ‘this is ME!’ – but I’ve never had that ‘To Tracey’ thing. I suppose when Thundercat finally publishes The Amazing Adventures of Thundercat I can expect some kind of front matter mention, even if it’s only ’she could have fed me on time once in a while.’

I’ve been doing some editing for a German PhD candidate who was writing in English, and he’s submitting next week, so this weekend was the final installment. And I was thoroughly pleased to read the following paragraph:

I am also very grateful to those who participated in the experiments, and to Tracey S. Rosenberg for correcting what I thought was English. I do not know which of the two tasks is more annoying.

I’m guessing the experiments, as his English was pretty darn good. The most frequent issue with non-native English speakers is when they’re writing perfectly grammatical English, but it simply doesn’t sound right. We all know what is meant by ‘the cat is placid’ but it’s a sore thumb. Sometimes this happens when they’re thinking in their native language and translating literally, so the nuances get lost. I find it charming, but alas, my job is to make it sound academic. Which, I think, I succeeded in – so fingers crossed that the experiments were as thoughtfully pursued as the quest for native-level English, and that the PhD comes soon!

In the category of ‘I have no idea why I find this amusing but I kind of do’: I’ve been keeping up with the Typo Eradication Advancement League’s quest to correct typos across America, ever since linking to them several entries ago, and I got mentioned over in their own comment threads (right here) under the description ‘you are mentioned in this woman’s blog’. And here is this woman mentioning you again. Rock on, etc.

Which reminds me, I saw a t-shirt today which meant to say zebras but actually said zebra’s. I’ll post a picture after Rhys and my phone spend more than ten seconds in the house at the same time.

Baghdad, boots, and bluetooth

Thanks to everyone who’s offered suggestions about getting photos off my phone. Rhys muttered something about having a blue tooth, or a blue tongue, which I thought was a disease mostly restricted to sheep and I’m certainly not going to kiss him until he’s cured, or at least till the photos are downloaded. I probably won’t post any, though, because I am too busy weeping for humanity over a chalked-up advertisement for a sporting event which is billed as “Team X v’s Team Y”.

Meanwhile, Thundercat has spent the last ten minutes vanquishing a hiking boot.

Just finished reading Edna Ferber’s A Peculiar Treasure, which isn’t really a writing book because she doesn’t talk much about process, but she addresses one of the nagging questions faced by anyone’s who’s stood aside at an emotional event (visits to hospital beds are good for this), coolly trying to pin down the perfect descriptive phrase and simultaneously wondering if they’re actually a vampire for doing so:

It is the lot of the imaginative creative writer always to look on, never to participate. Or perhaps it is nothing like this, so highfalutin, but merely the reporter in me who sees and mentally notes and senses the dramatic overtones – and trudges back to the office with her story. Still one must be either a spectator or a participant. One can’t march in a parade and see it too.

True, but then again, no two people on the side of the road are going to see the same parade, either.

And finally, have just learned that my buddy Ed is writing a blog about his time in Baghdad: http://egsinbaghdad.blogspot.com/.

How well do you know “etiquette”?

K over at Square One sent me a link to a grammar blog: The “blog” of “unnecessary” quotation marks. It is very “amusing” though also “kind of” sad.

Think you know your historical etiquette? The McCord Museum invites you to prove it, with their fantastic interactive quiz about proper behavior in the nineteenth-century. You can play either a man or a woman – or, heck, try them both! They certainly aren’t parallel, as the man has a far more interesting time at his club than the woman does in the park. (Didn’t Lord Peter Wimsey say something about chivalry being the desire to have nine-tenths of the fun?)

When you’re bored of being proper, you can then move on to see if you’d survive the Roaring Twenties. That Edna Ferber autobiography I’m reading (published in 1938) will hopefully come in handy!

If nothing else, play these games for the Gilliam-esque animations. 

Grammar Across America

Every so often, I yearn to start a blog about bad grammar.  I would call it Grammar Shame (unless someone else got to the name first) and post all sorts of photos about the bad grammar and spelling I see in my daily life. But I never start it, for three important reasons:

a) It would depress me a lot.

b) Probably someone else already does it and has a snazzy web design.

c) I would have to figure out how to get all these photos off my phone.

But NPR has a story about Jeff Deck, a guy who started the Typo Eradication Advancement League, and who is my new hero.

Jeff is keeping a blog of his travels around the country.

I wonder how he will feel at the end of four months of correcting typos.

I wonder whether his tireless work will make any difference.

But mostly, I wonder how he gets his photos off his phone.