Do you get all judgy when you see a spam email with a lot of spelling and grammar mistakes? I have judged, I cannot lie! But think again. These scammers aren’t stupid. They know exactly what they’re doing and those mistakes? They’re deliberate!
Here’s why:
Scammers want gullible people. They don’t want grammarians. Their deliberate mistakes weed out the righteous and save them time because they know these folks won’t ultimately fall victim.
Misspelled words have agreater chance of making it past spam filters that look for keywords and phrases often used in phishing schemes.
Some people think the mistakes make the sender appear more human. We all make mistakes, right? Susceptible people relate to this and are more likely to be tricked.
Spammers aren’t your friends and they definitely don’t need a grammar lesson. Don’t waste your time thinking about their mistakes. Just delete!
I always wonder what to do when I refer to something that belongs to a person whose name ends in an s. In grammar talk, that’s the possessive case of nouns. Guess what? There are two correct ways to do it, so no stress! Just be consistent.
A couple days ago at work, I had to decide whether to use any time or anytime on a social media post so I did a quick check to decide what to do. Here’s what I found:
While both mean the same thing, each is used in slightly different situations
Most often, any time functions as a noun phrase, after the preposition at.
I am available for a Zoom call at any time tomorrow.
You can also say:
Any time tomorrow is a good time for a Zoom call.
More casually, if someone says thank you, your response could be:
Any time!
Anytime is an adverb that means at any time.
You can Zoom call me anytime tomorrow.
If you’re not sure, substitute whenever and see if it still makes sense.
I recently hesitated when I wrote the phrase “look no further,” referring to a search for Thanksgiving recipes. Was that correct? I thought back to the old rule reminding me that farther meant physical distance and further, well it’s different, but I couldn’t remember exactly why.
Jump to Grammarly, which explains it in detail, yet I’m still a little confused. Here is what seems clear to me about further and farther:
Farther connotes distance, but it can also refer to a more advanced point.
Both further and farther are adverbs, but further can also be a verb, as in, “She furthered her career” as well as an adjective, such as, “pursuing further information.” Still okay, but now things get murky:
Grammarly poses the question, “How do the definitions of farther and further overlap? Can you use further or farther away in the same way?” The answer:
“Some usage guides disagree, but both terms have been used interchangeably to describe physical distance.”
The following examples of confused me even more:
“The further from one another, the nearer one can be.”—August Strindberg, The Road to Damascus
“I have come home at last! This is my real country! I belong here. This is the land I have been looking for all my life, though I never knew it till now . . . Come further up, come further in!” —C. S. Lewis, The Last Battle
I felt a little better after I read further (haha, get it?).
The Chicago Manual of Style defers to Webster’s 11th Collegiate Dictionary, which says:
“Farther and further have been used more or less interchangeably throughout most of their history, but currently they are showing signs of diverging. As adverbs they continue to be used interchangeably whenever spatial, temporal, or metaphorical distance is involved. But where there is no notion of distance, further is used.”
Their final tip is to remember that only further means moreover.
I’m probably going to do what I usually do when I’m unsure of correct usage, which is to rewrite the sentence so I don’t have to deal with it!
Do you have the further/farther rule down? What’s your secret?
By the way, when I ran the Spelling & Grammar check on this post, Microsoft Word gave me a 90%. That’s one of their new, annoying features.
I’ll leave you with one of my favorite Jackson Browne songs, Farther On.
I’ve been thinking a lot about which is correct: “free” or “for free.”
Grammar Monster says “Strict grammarians will tell you that ‘for free’ is grammatically incorrect because ‘free’ is not a noun, and this means it cannot be preceded by ‘for’ (a preposition). In their view, something is ‘sold for nothing’ or is ‘sold free.’ However, through common usage, ‘for free’ has become acceptable.”
On the question of inbetween, in between, in-between or just plain between, which is correct? First off, inbetween is not a word, so let’s throw that in the bad grammar bin right away.
But when/if should you use in between, in-between and between?
Catherine Traffis of Grammarly confirms my first statement and says:
In between should always appear as two words. Although inbetween is common, it is a misspelling and does not appear in any English dictionary.
Unnecessarily adding in to between is also a common grammatical mistake.
As a compound adjective, in-between should be hyphenated.
This Business Writing blog post by James Smith explains further:
Inbetween is an improper form of the word and should not appear in writing.
In between is generally accepted in speech, but when writing, eliminate “in” and use the more concise “between” instead.
In-between is grammatically correct when the word is used as an adjective, indicating an existence between two abstract intermediary stages.
In summary, instead of in between, just say or write between. And when you’re describing the middle part of something, use in-between. Eliminating all use of inbetween is easy to remember and getting rid of the in when you really just mean between is also easy. If you’re still not sure about in-between, here’s an example
My once-short hair is at that awkward in-between stage where it’s both too short and too long!
When my kids were little, they liked to play an arcade game on our computer. This was before the age of cell phones and tablets for every person over 5, so the family computer was where they played. The game had been a birthday present for one of them and was a low-budget addition to something else they’d received. The first time they played, when the game was over, the results appeared on the screen: “Winner” or, if things didn’t go well, “Looser” – that’s right L-O-O-S-E-R. I’ve always thought it was pretty harsh to call someone a loser, but we had a big laugh over how the makers of the game needed a spelling/grammar lesson. Years later, this little joke still comes up in conversation.
This article on cnbc.com about common grammar mistakes (written or spoken) made me think about that computer game and sure enough, lose vs. loose is on the list. Here are some very basic explanations. Some may be obvious to you, but I like having a refresher!
UNNECESSARY APOSTROPES: Resist the urge to add an apostrophe just because a word ends in “s.” Apostrophes are for contractions like can’t or to show possession. “I can’t go to the movies because I have to pick up my sister’s dress at the store.” I don’t usually go wrong with this one, except when showing possession for a person whose last name ends in “s.” Then it seems as if anything goes. Some people put an apostrophe with no “s” and other people put an apostrophe and another s. As in Ross’ book or Ross’s book. Which is it? Is that a regional thing?
EVERYDAY VS. EVERY DAY: This one’s not too hard. “These are my everyday shoes, as in the ones I wear every day.”
I VS. ME: Use I when it’s the subject of the sentence. Use me after a preposition. “I went to the store.” “Those cupcakes are for Joe and me.” Now, here’s a question for you: do you say, “It is I” when you’re calling someone or knocking on their door? It sounds so formal! I break the rule and say, “It’s me” and hope the grammar police aren’t on the other side of the door!
IT’S VS. ITS: For this one, think contraction vs. possession. Back in the days of yore when the landline rang and you were expecting a call, you’d run to the phone before anyone else could get it and on your way you’d call out, “I’ve got it. It’s for me!” Use its with no apostrophe to show possession, as in, “The storm reared its ugly head.”
LESS VS. FEWER: The general rule is to use fewer when it’s something that can be counted. Think about the signs at the express lanes in the grocery story. They often say “20 items or less” but that’s wrong. They should say “20 items or fewer.” Use less when the number can’t reasonably be counted (like snowflakes in a snowstorm) or when the number is part of a total unit like “less than 50 percent.”
LIE VS. LAY: I’m not gonna lie 😉, I work hard to avoid using these words altogether, especially lay. But here’s what to do. Say “I want to liedown” if you’re tired and need a rest and “Lay that book on the table” when you’re referring to an object.
LOSE VS. LOOSE: Loserefers to a competition or simply misplacing something. Loose means the opposite of tight.
THAT VS. WHO: That refers to things and whorefers to people. What about book characters? Are they people or things? Does anyone know the rule for that?
THEN VS. THAN: Then refers to a period of time. Use thanwhen you’re comparing things.
THERE/THEIR/THEY’RE: This one’s easy. There shows direction, their shows possession and they’re is a contraction for “they are.”
YOUR VS YOU’RE: Also easy. Yourshows possession and you’re is a contraction for “you are.”
I always had a hard time with grammar and tenses when I studied French. I can’t imagine keeping this straight if I were learning English as a second (or third) language. Have you had the same experience when learning another language?
I’ve made many grammar mistakes over the years, including a recent misspelling in a literacy tweet I did for work. Talk about embarrassing. I think I caught it before anyone noticed, but I’ll never know for sure. If it ever comes up, my plan is to blame it on autocorrect! Would anyone else like to join me on the grammar/misspelling wall of shame? Leave your confession in the comments! And if you see an error in this post, typo or otherwise, let me know in the comments and I’ll fix it!
Did you know that today is National Punctuation Day? Who knew there was whole day set aside to think about punctuation?
I could probably use a brush-up on these rules. One of my kids recently told me that he got major points off an essay I had checked because of a run-on sentence. I guess I didn’t catch a misused comma or semicolon! So much for bragging about being an English major in college…
To celebrate this big day, I grabbed these grammar and punctuation books at the library. I’m going to flip through them and try to nail down some of my comma weaknesses!
In case you were wondering, National Punctuation Day was founded in 2004 by a guy named Jeff Rubin (nationalpunctuationday.com). You can learn more about Jeff here.
How do you feel about adding that apostrophe to dos, even though it’s technically wrong and only there to make things look better?
I mean, if you add an apostrophe to do’s, to be consistent, you’d need to an extra apostrophe to don’ts so that it looks like:
do’s and don’t’s
That looks weird. And on this everyone seems to agree. But the grammar and style experts disagree about that extra apostrophe.
The AP Stylebook says do’s and don’ts. We happened to have a copy here, so I looked it up.
The Chicago Manual of Style recommends dos and don’ts (I don’t have a copy to check and you need an online subscription to access).
The rule across the board is whichever style you prefer, stick with it. If you need more info, here’s a post from vocabulary.com about the dos and don’ts on do’s and don’ts.
Which do you prefer? I prefer dos and don’ts. It seems more pure to me. And by the way, is it correct to say more pure or purer? I’ll tackle that on a different day!
I recently read a book in which many of the characters were advised to lay low because danger lurked and they didn’t want to be found out. This is a commonly used phrase and we all know what it means, but did you know that the correct advice would be to lie low?
I talked about the lowdown on lay and lie in a post a couple years ago, but not specifically about laying low or lying low.
Merriam-Webster says lay low is a transitive verb and that it means “to bring or strike to earth or to knock out of a fight or out of action.”
So the person on the other end of laying low is not exactly staying out of danger, maybe just the opposite!
LawProse offers more explanation and sites some examples from a documentary that got it wrong and a journalist who got it right.
Which way do you say it? If we all know what it means to lay low, should it matter? I like to follow the rules, so I vote for lie low. But maybe saying lay low is more authentic to a character in a book. I don’t know. Leave a comment and tell me what you think.
Book Club Mom 
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