The OED is not "offical English". Their remit has always been descriptive, not prescriptive. In fact, there's no such thing as official English. Civil Servants do not control the language; we leave that sort of nonsense to the French.
If that happened here it would be chaos: white paper proposals about changes to the subjunctive, targets for reducing split infinitive, datasticks full of adverbs left in the pub.
As I said in another thread, don't get so hooked on accuracy.
You forget what you were trying to say in the first place.
Innit.
In the above instance I would have gone with a colon, rather than a new sentence; and certainly not a paragraph break. 'Innit', however, probably can stand as a separate paragraph.
I hope this helps.
Quote: Tursiops @ 9th December 2013, 10:28 AM GMTIn the above instance I would have gone with a colon,
And that sir is quite enough about your personal life.
Quote: Stephen Goodlad @ 9th December 2013, 9:50 AM GMT... learning from the pro's.
Sticklers for good grammar will tell you the plural of pro is pros. Some may argue that being a contraction of professionals, pros requires an apostrophe to indicate the omission of the fessional. When referring to professionals in truncated form, use pros. Context is everything, so you can probably avoid using prossies or even prozzas unless writing dialogue.
Q.E.D.
I'm learning already.
It's all convention and consensus, isn't it? Lewis Carroll always used sha'n't instead of shan't, using the logic that omissions had occurred in two places in the word. That could easily have caught on.
And, yes, I would omit the apostrophe in pros, because I think pro is an accepted abbreviation, just in the same way as I wouldn't write 'bus or 'cello, or 'fridge'. But then again, could I say that it would be wrong to use proes? No, I couldn't.
I think, in orthopgraphical terms, there is a difference bewteen being "right" and being "correct".
Quote: Kenneth @ 9th December 2013, 10:46 AM GMTyou can probably avoid using prossies
You ask a lot.
Language evolves when it conveys meaning.
Quote: sglen @ 9th December 2013, 12:05 AM GMTOh my!
Sorry if I got annoying at all, Carlos! Reading back tonight, I think I'd totally misunderstood what you were trying to say. I agree that the technical stuff comes after all the other stuff, I just thought you were saying technical stuff should never be mentioned, and I thought that went too far. Might also be the proofreader in me - used to do that for a living - it makes you a crazy pedant after a while.
No worries Sglen, and thanks. I can't even remember what I was saying, and if I read it back I would probably be apologising to you, and saying technical stuff should never be mentioned would be a step too far I agree.
Thank you
You Know, Although this all started from me writing a very bad poem, I now feel it was worthwhile just because the way it became more about Grammar and literacy than anything else. I for one learnt that I can't just put any old Cr*p on here and expect you to translate, and I agree, we all make mistakes, even when trying ( I assume many of you will find fault in this statement and I'm trying not to make any mistakes!) but I think that's the point! I can't help it if I you think my post is no good, I don't mean to post rubbish but I think most people have done this from time to time, but I can at least try and make it legible. and I will try harder, I know I won't be perfect at it, but I also know I was lazy in not even reading back and trying to get it right, and I think that's the point we can all take away, Don't be lazy, if you put "Your" when it should be "You're" people might not like it, but they can understand it, but if you put "ur" or a very bad spelling of a word, its just pointless posting in the first place.
I genuinely thank you for pointing that out and promise to try harder.
P.S. If anyone can teach this to the people on Facebook and twitter, it would be greatly appreciated!
Just to clarify - my issue was with the content of the poem, not the grammar or spelling. This isn't about the quality of the work, but the mean spirited attitude that was clearly behind it. The current version is not quite as bad.
