To tell you that it's "rein" not "reign".

[FlyingElbows]

Because it is and it's doing my tits in!!

Rein. Rein. Rein. Rein. Rein.

Free rein. It's an equestrian term meaning to give the horse freedom of movement.

It is NOT reign. That's what the Queen does.

It's right up there with "intensive purposes" and "doggy dog world"!!

All of these drive me nuts - I suppose not many people actually read & write properly anymore - they start to write it on social media as they think it is spelt, the spellchecker does its bit which may or may not help, & there you are, it's all being shared & perpetuated.

Excellent explanation Ravenmum

Ahh, I have found my people!

'Gotten' is a particular irritant for me. Not quite the same type of mispronunciation but irritating nevertheless!

And as a horsey person whose high horse is higher than yours, OP , a huge for correcting the rein/reign business! It drives me potty!

Gotten is a proper word though - currently American & formerly British.

If folk were putting Gottun it'd annoy me more!

wasonthelist I think that's the present historic and French like it. A lot.
Correct me if I'm wrong

Gotten is a proper word though - currently American & formerly British.

True. It's an older form that came with us to the New World that we kept. "Fall" for autumn is another.

And documentary makers use it a lot. Which makes it confusing when they then refer back to another occasion. But we all seem to understand it ... probably because the pictures explain it.

Oh, don't rein on my parade.

My local grocer sells Colly Flowers and Hearty Chokes. Really good ones too.

I suspect they're taking the piss a bit though as they can spell Romanesco, Egremont and Daikon perfectly well.

Escape goat.

escape goat

Thank you. This has been driving me nuts.

The situation has certainly been exasperated by people trying to use words and phrases they don't know the real meaning or use of :)

That example came from my local newspaper - time was when you could trust the "professionals" most of the time, now they are often the worst culprits.

Almost nobody in the UK can spell licence in spite of it being written on their photocard.

The correct spelling of lead (the Verb) in the past tense is also all but extinct.

I have only heard doggy dog world in modern family

wasonthelist is the exasperated example the one in print? Good ironic one.

Yep l think people think 'led' looks wrong so we see 'lead' a lot.

There's a clip on YouTube of Dave Gorman talking about misheard and used Cat Phrases

Which included doggy dog world (hit post before I meant to!)

Passed and past gets on my tits too.

You might've passed the restaurant on your journey but you went past it.

Squirter - As far as I know it's still BOGOF, not BOGOFF.

I posted earlier saying I wasn't a pedant but am begging to realise I might be!! And also realised I am a lot more forgiving of verbal inaccuracies than of written ones.

One thing that I find really find difficult not to correct whether in RL or online is 'well. I turned around and I was like xxxx and then he/she turned around and was like xxxx.'
I long to ask were you both really both twirling around as you conversed , and did you did you just say xxxx or did you just convey it through thought and sign language. But of course I will never say that because whoever I said it to would (quite rightly) turn around and like, smack me in the face or tear me a new one.

Is the turning round thing universal or is It a London /SE thing?

I've noticed a weird grammatical quirk creeping in on MN and FB, just over the past year or so, whereby "needs" is followed by a past participle rather than a present one, so:

"The baby's nappy needs changed." (rather than "needs changing" or "needs to be changed".)

"The dog needs walked", etc.

How did this come about? Are people getting too lazy to put in the "to be"? It really grates when I see it as it is just obviously wrong.

I have just been a bit of a twat on fb and corrected someone's punctuation on a poster they have designed (they had used a few rogue apostrophes). I tried to do it nicely but they probably just think I'm a pedantic know-all twat. The thing is, this poster/flyer was meant to be a professional advertisement for a local business so it should really be correct. Rogue apostrophes do my head in as well!

I reckon it boils down to people using words phrases they don't know the meaning of, resulting in 'eh wallah' etc. Why would you do that?!

Why on earth shouldn't they try out new (to them) forms of expression in an informal setting on MN? Or are you supposed to emerge fully formed with all the expressions and vocabulary you will ever use at the age of 18? I like to think learning is a life long process myself. Threads like this are very useful for that purpose, but let's not be too self-congratulatory about it.

Many posters don't have English as a first language. Many posters don't speak with an RP accent or Standard English (shock horror). Not everyone here has had the benefit of a fantastic education: whether you have is more of an accident of where and to whom you were born than anything else.