ThAn thAn thAaaaaan

[Thispupsgottofly]

I swear this didn't use to be such a common error, but I have read so many posts today where people say then when they mean than!
I guess it's because lots of people (including me) pronounce it 'thn'.
Eg. If you say you'd rather stay at home then go to the beach it sounds like you're going to do one after the other!
Aaaaargh!

Has anyone else noticed all the “n” instead of “and” lately? I keep seeing posts with it and it’s baffling. Along the lines of “its just me n my kids n I know he loves us n wants the best for us n I understand but…” Where does that even come from? It seems batshit to me.

Some of them are definitely speech to text mangling people’s accents. Especially things like “his” instead of he’s. I think they pronounce it that way and the phone doesn’t know the difference.

Not seen the then/than thing. Thank goodness. My favourite at the moment is a website I saw where someone was looking forward a meal which included dolphin wars potatoes. They will always be known as such in my home now!

I’m always twitching at the increasingly atrocious SPAG on here, though I’ve not actually noticed ‘then’ for ‘than’.

I know people who write 'been' instead of 'being'. I suppose they must be human beans?

Has anyone else noticed all the “n” instead of “and” lately? I keep seeing posts with it and it’s baffling. Along the lines of “its just me n my kids n I know he loves us n wants the best for us n I understand but…” Where does that even come from? It seems batshit to me.

I have, I think it’s just one poster that keeps popping up.

🥱

Yes, actually you are probably right, thinking about it. The conversation between us would likely not be quite as sparkling as I'd like!
Someone I met in person described an event that disappointed him as "a bit of a damp squid" and I couldn't get past it. There were other signs that he wasn't going to pan out, to be fair but I still felt very judgy.

Didn’t used to be.

Oh no 🙈

One which drives me absolutely round the bloody twist, is “he’s” instead of his. Very common in West Yorkshire but creeping in all over. One of my exes used to actually (verbally!) say “I’m going to he’s wedding” or “It belongs to he’s wife”.
Reader, I corrected him every, single time. Every time. Did it stop him? Nope. 🙂‍↔️

@Purplecatshopaholic we call them dolphin nose potatoes after a friend's mispronunciation 😂

THIS! ⬆️ By the bucket-load! Read it, take every word in, slowly. Process it as you go. Slowly. It’s not that hard!!

’OP said in her post that they’ve no kids/they’re renters/they’re not married. How did you miss that?!’

We used 'n' for 'and' in the 90s when text messages were limited on characters abs we had the numeric keypad things. Some people still do, although I've noticed it's mostly younger people who didn't have phones in the 90s if they were even born then

To be fair 'n' is a shortening for and. We know what salt n vinegar is.
My issue with then and than is it does change the whole meaning of the sentence!

The curious thing is that my children’s primary school education focussed so much more on grammar than my own did in the late 70s and 80s.

My children are in their early 20s and have a really good standard of grammar that won’t embarrass them, so why is it not the same for anyone that’s had a state education in the last 20 years?

Used not to be. Didn't used to be is incorrect. Didn't use to be is technically correct but sounds/looks weird!

I was actually going to say I also notice use when it should be used and suppose when it should be supposed! 🙃
Clearly, I need to get off my high horse!

It’s the pedants’ curse. You’ll always make an error in any post pointing out someone else’s mistake 😆

Agree that the written error is down to not reading much (absent dyslexia or similar). However, I care about writing and speaking well and would always pronounce than as ‘thn’. It’s a standard pronunciation unless stressing the word. It doesn’t ever sound like ‘then’ for me, though!

YABU

You are fortunate that you had a good education, you find English easy, you have no visual or physical limitations or a learning difficulty/disability that means you find correct spellings and grammar easy.

Not everyone is like that.

It annoys me how many people shame those with dyslexia or where English isn’t their first language etc.

I do understand. And I wouldn't comment on anyone's posts about it to correct them. I'm not trying to shame anyone. This is meant to be light-hearted.
Like I said, nobody is perfect. I have made errors in my posts.
I've seen the then/than thing in print and on products as well when surely they should be checked!

Also you have made quite a lot of assumptions about me there!
Yes, you are right about a lot of them 🙃
But I actually don't find spelling and grammar that easy. I don't think I have dyslexia but I always struggled with SPAG when I was at school.
It has improved since being a TA in a primary school. Especially in yr 6 when it's all about SPAG life.

A friend of mine who I would class as pretty well educated wrote that she was "non the wiser" the other day.

I didn't correct her, but I did reply repeating phrase but with the correct spelling.

"Painful" only has one 'l' even if we're not being pedantic. 😄

The other one I keep seeing on MN (including twice today!) is when people say that some phrase is being 'banded about'. Nope it's 'bandied', from the verb 'bandy'.