i blame my sweet momma.  i cannot avoid seeing spelling errors, grammar errors, punctuation errors in the newspaper, on newsletters, signs, websites, billboards.  we were perusing a website the other day and came across this headline.  it’s an irony that the word “prograMing” (with one M) was used next to the word “educational”… i mean, exactly how “educational” can the programming be if it can’t even be spelled correctly?  aaack. it’s one of those little things that makes me a little bit crazy.  i can’t help it.

that fact (that it makes me a little bit crazy) doesn’t exempt me from mistakes of my own.  certainly, i have racked up a few too.  but my momma was one-of-those-people who made me use a dictionary at all times and would point out the correct usage of punctuation and grammar.  and i am grateful to her!  she would say, “if you aren’t sure, look it up.”

you’ve all seen something along the lines of this:

it’s true.  it’s a little thing, but in these days of so many wrongs, every little thing done right counts.  even if it’s a mere comma.  even if it’s the apostrophe after the word “it” or, the (correct) absence of an apostrophe to pluralize a noun.   “dog’s” for “dogs” makes me, yep, a little crazy.  (geesh…thank you, momma!)

we were driving through alabama on a back road; it had taken us south toward florida over 100 miles and the scenery was pretty varied.  alabama is an interestingly textured state – from the duct tape letters spelling out “deer rendering” on a black plastic sign hanging next to a long overgrown dirt driveway to the vast cattle ranches with big houses and multiple outbuildings.  but there was one place that we passed that made us just keeeeeeep gooooooing, although i do wish we had stopped to take a photograph.  since we didn’t, david drew you a picture.

are you ready for this?  it was a skating rink.  named – sharpshooters skating rink.  now, despite the pristine spelling and grammar with an itty-bitty punctuation error, some words just shouldn’t ever be put together.   agreed?

read DAVID’S thoughts on this MERELY A THOUGHT MONDAY