I've been making a list...

[DonateBloodNCheckSmokeAlarms]

Hello

Only just found this part of Mumsnet!

Here is a list I have been compiling for a while for my own personal amusement/therapy.

Comments welcome!

APOSTROPHE ERRORS
It’s/Its
Who’s/whose
I hate Tory’s (greengrocer’s apostrophe)
Baby’s/babies (that’s my babies dummy)
Nobodies/nobody’s (nobodies business) (anybody’s, somebody’s)
Families instead of family’s
Parent’s instead of parents’
Ladies instead of lady’s
No apostrophe in "clients" so no telling whether singular or plural

SPELLING MISTAKES
Affect/effect
Bear/Bare
Alot (as one word)
Aswell (as one word)
Phased/fazed
Principal/principle
Practice/practise
Stationary/stationery (e for envelope)
Drivers license/driving licence
Should of, would of, could of/should have, would have, could have
Ect/etc
Draw for “drawer” (chester draws)
Off/of
Loose/lose
Queue/cue
Peak/pique

GRAMMATICAL ERRORS
Seen/saw
Went/gone
Done/did
Ran/run
Rang/rung
Gave/given
Came/come
Sat/sitting
Stood/Standing
Lay/lie (eg I’m having a lay-in)
Gotten/got or become
That/who (the people that…)
There’s many / “there are” many
Myself/me eg “please let myself know”
Her/she eg “her and David were able to stay”
Verbs used as nouns eg “invite” “quote”

GENERAL IGNORANCE
Decimated used wrongly (it means reduced by 10% not "destroyed")
Literally used wrongly (eg "I literally exploded")
Imply/infer
Brought/bought
Adverse/averse

PRONOUNCIATION
People who go up at the end of the sentence?
Somefink
Aks instead of ask
Not pronouncing “r” eg “fowad” instead of “forward”
Pacific
Haitch

IRRITATING WORDS OR PHRASES
Reach out
Reader, (I married him)
My lovely mum etc
…, no?
So….
….Discuss.
Look…, (sounds aggressive but Australians do it)
Listen…, (ditto)
Gifted (instead of given)
Loaned instead of lent
(name) from Accounts
Can I get…? (in restaurants etc)
People who use your name repeatedly in sentences and say “yourself” in order to endear themselves to you

Oh, here's another - I hate it when people use a random number of dots intead of the prescribed three...

@Summererfluff yes!! I remember trying to explain that to someone years ago and they just laughed at me and told me I was ridiculous, grrrrr!

The incorrect usage of discreet/discrete makes me sad

OT but I love that you get an ellipsis if you long press the . button. It's handy on Twitter / where there's a character limit.

People who get sayings wrong is another thing that annoys me!

Being on tender hooks instead of tenterhooks.
Doing something off your own back instead of off your own bat.
Mute point instead of moot point (though Joey’s ‘Friends’ explanation of a moo point did make me laugh!)

Oh, and spelling seperate incorrectly! There’s ‘a rat’ in separate!

This is, and always has been, correct. There are no new rules.

I see "lead" used a lot, instead of "led", as in "She lead the IT Team for five years." Must be a pencil/metal thing.

Er decimated has two meanings one of which is destruction.

Someone near me had a car with a sign on the door saying 'Rachels Catering'. I came out one morning and she had redone it with the apostrophe. Result!

Not quite the same thing, but I get irritated by someone who insists on calling St Pancras station 'St Pancreas'.

Someone please explain why ‘ May I have’ is correct but ‘Can I get’ is not?

If I’m buying a coffee, I may indeed say ‘please can I get’ . I’m Canadian, and it is a very widespread way of asking for things. Why is it wrong?

People think "can I get" is rude.

@EmmaH2022 surely that card is an ironic one? Meant to wind up pedants like us? It's not genuine .... is it? 🤯

But if I’m saying ‘please can I get a caramel macchiato’ and smiling, I don’t believe that’s rude.

@Dotcheck if you're saying it with a Canadian accent, we will let you off as not knowing any better. :-)

The thing is, I am noticing is that 'does it really matter? is creeping into times when it really does. I am an avid reader and I despair of the amount of errors. It really affects the way I feel about a book.

This might be the only place ever that I can complain about this so I'm going to go for it

No, you did not 'marinade' your chicken. You marinated your chicken, in a marinade.

Thanks for letting me get that out OP

Can I add 'are' instead 'our'

I'm guessing it's the way some people pronounce 'our' but it really bugs me when reading it in a sentence.

I can't see any reason to think it's ironic

It's on the 60th birthday card as well.

Aw, shucks 😇

I think you mean "the number of errors", not "amount", as they can be counted. ;)

Sorry - you just reminded me of another bugbear!

@Dotcheck no problem, we will say no more "aboot" it ;-D

If someone pulled me up on my use of decimate with your explanation I would roll my eyes. A lot.

Defiantly is very often autocorrect kicking in incorrectly. It annoys me when I’m typing,

I think instead of making your big important list, you could have looked through some previous pedant MN threads and realised your list has been covered at least a thousand times before. * hyperbole

Wonder when it should be wander.

"Miss, Can I go toilet?"

deep breath

"MAY you go TO THE toilet? Yes, you MAY."

@PuppyMonkey I wouldn't have bothered with my list had I know this Pedant's Corner existed! :-)

Ok, here's another: "boarder" instead of "border".

Oooft, glad to know about "decimate", thanks!!