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Error ID Number: 54
URL: <http://dedalvs.com/guide/search_english.php?word=54> Problem(s):- Why doesn't it list my favorite flavor of ice cream on my driver license?
- Why doesn't it list my favorite flavor of ice cream on my drivers license?
- Why doesn't it list my favorite flavor of ice cream on my drivers' license?
- Why doesn't it list my favorite flavor of ice cream on my driver licence?
- Why doesn't it list my favorite flavor of ice cream on my drivers licence?
- Why doesn't it list my favorite flavor of ice cream on my drivers' licence?
- Why doesn't it list my favorite flavor of ice cream on my driver's' liscensce'?
Solution(s):- Why doesn't it list my favorite flavor of ice cream on my driver's license?
Explanation:- Many have trouble even saying this one, let alone writing it. So, how does it work? First, unless, you're British, it's "license": one c, one s. Don't like it? Move to Britain. Then you can spell it licence all you want (and defence, etc.). Alternatively, you can start speaking with a British accent, and spelling "color" colour, calling the subway the tube, and eating fish and chips, bangers and mash and shepherd's pie. Be wary of talking to anyone who might actually be from Britain, though, because they'll probably find you out and expose you. If you find yourself in a situation that would force you to either reveal your identity or speak phony British English to a Brit, I strongly recommend you rely on your ninja school training to escape. What's that? You didn't go to ninja school?! Well, then. I guess you'd better start spelling it "license" straight away, hadn't you?
Of course, the major problem people have is usually with the first part: the driver. If you take a step back and think of this as a phrase rather than a compound, I think you'll see why the solution sentence above is correct:
Heather is a driver.
All drivers need licenses.
Therefore, Heather needs a driver's license.
That is, a license needed by a driver. Ta da!
If you're confused, though, don't feel bad, by any means. If Wikipedia can be trusted (and I think we all know the answer to that), apparently the official term used in the United States is (drumroll please!): "driver license." Ha! What a hoot! The "official" term is something that almost none of us ever say. Oh well. That's the government for you.
If you're ever in a bind, remember: a license is something that must be owned or obtained by a driver in order for them to drive. As for whether it should be "driver's" or "drivers'", well, if many drivers need licenses, then it stands to reason that a single driver needs a license, right?
This brings up the issue of pluralization. I've often seen plurals such as "drivers' licenses", or "drivers licenses", "driver's license's", "driver license's", "drivers' licenses'", and any combination of the preceding. This one shouldn't cause trouble as long as you remember what the noun is: license! The whole "driver's" part is just extra information, and doesn't need to change.
I can certainly understand why one would resort to one of these odd pluralization strategies (it's the influence of that naughty 's at the end of "driver's"! It's always up to no good!), but if you're in a spot, remember: You're bigger than the English language. You own it. You create it on a daily basis! It does what you say, not the other way around! You shouldn't be afraid of the English language: It should be afraid of you! So if it tries to confuse you with its tricksy apostrophes, hyphens and esses, you just grab it by the shoulders, and say, "Hey, buddy! You're my language!" You show it who's boss! Don't you take no guff from no language! It has to answer to us, not the other way around!
Categories: | 1 / 10 / 2009 |
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Error ID Number: 53
URL: <http://dedalvs.com/guide/search_english.php?word=53> Problem(s):- All hard working men love ice cream.
Solution(s):- All hard-working men love ice cream.
Explanation:- No, I am not being persnickety: this is a real problem. Take a gander at that problem sentence. Can you think of another interpretation than the sense given in the solution sentence? Any other interpretation? Perhaps instead of "men that are hard-working", you might read "working men that are..." Well. Ahem.
So. Presuming that is not what you meant to say, this is the reason we have hyphens! No, they're not just for breaking up long words at the end of a line (and they most certainly are not dashes!), they actually serve a regular purpose. Whenever we come up with a coinage like "hard-working" that, for whatever reason, hasn't been accepted as a single word (see if Google auto-corrects your word, and you'll know if it's been accepted [and what do you know! "Hardworking" has been accepted! But let's pretend for the sake of argument that it hasn't been yet]), the elements that comprise it must be separated by a hyphen. This is crucial when the interpretation of those elements as a string would lend the sentence a different meaning. In order to keep those interpretations separate, we must use a hyphen with one, and a space with the other.
In case you're wondering why we don't run into this problem in speech, let me remind you that writing is nothing but an approximation of spoken language, an its most obvious deficiency lies in its representation of intonation. The phrases "hard working men" and "hard-working men" have distinct intonational patterns, and would never be confused by a native English speaker (or listener). In writing, all we have to go on is the absence or presence of a hyphen. Since little bits like hyphens, commas, dots on i's, etc., are the likeliest to be left out, what we're confronted with, more often than not, is an absent hyphen. Consequently, confusion can arise—even if the context would otherwise make it clear.
But, hey, I'm a reasonable guy. If I look at the problem sentence above, I'll probably interpret it correctly. (Well, if I feel like it.) But know ye this: internet humor is puerile. Desire ye that your written words be made a mockery of on internet fora and blog posts? Nay? Methinks my case resteth.
Categories: | 10 / 27 / 2008 |
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Error ID Number: 49
URL: <http://dedalvs.com/guide/search_english.php?word=49> Problem(s):- I've eaten thir-teen-thousand five-hundred, eighty nine ice cream cones since I turned twenty.
Solution(s):- I've eaten thirteen thousand, five hundred and eighty-nine ice cream cones since I turned twenty.
Explanation:- It's rare that one actually wants to spell out a long number like 13,589, but just in case, this is how you do it. To summarize:
- Commas go where they would in the number (after "thirteen thousand", and not elsewhere).
- Two digit numbers greater than twenty that aren't divisible by ten are written with a hyphen; other numbers (e.g., numbers in the hundreds, thousands and millions [save instances like "sixty-nine thousand", which is a two digit number followed by a separate number word]) are not.
- It is generally "proper" to include the word "and" to separate the hundreds number from the number that follows (e.g., "one hundred and one"; "two hundred and twenty-seven", etc.).
Now, to address a common question: Can one just write 13,589? Sure, why not? If you do, though, the number one rule is: be consistent! Never write something like, "This past summer, I saw one horror movie, 3 comedies, 5 dramas, and eight sports movies". It's simply confusing to the eye. So when it comes to numbers, find a style you like, and stick with it (unless you have a persnickety professor who demands you do it in a particular way, in which case, do it like s/he says until the end of the class, and then go back to doing it how you like).
Categories: | 7 / 21 / 2008 |
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Error ID Number: 44
URL: <http://dedalvs.com/guide/search_english.php?word=44> Problem(s):- All American's agree that being able to eat ice cream is more important than voting.
Solution(s):- All Americans agree that being able to eat ice cream is more important than voting.
Explanation:- I have a theory regarding the peculiar use of the 's plural of nationalities. It all started with Bob Marley. One of the reasons Bob Marley decided not to have his cancerous toe amputated is that according to Rastafarian religion, the body must be kept whole. As a result, the cancer spread throughout his body, and he died young. So influenced are we by the man and his message, that we've extended his ideals to writing. Thus, the mighty term "American" must be left whole. To keep it whole, the lowly plural "s" must be separated from the word with an apostrophe, so that it doesn't violate the sanctity of almighty "American". (Bob Marley would be down with that, right? Wasn't it he who said, "The Caribbean has no greater friend than the American government. It's beneficence and power is not only to be respected, but to be loved. Let us all worship at the feet of our magnanimous neighbor to the north!"? I'm pretty sure he was the one that said that.)
Though my theory is sound (it must be: it's a theory), it doesn't quite explain how we can get away with attaching the "n" to "America" without the aid of an apostrophe (i.e., "America'n"). Hmm... Perhaps "America" and "American" are two different wholes that must not be violated. Yes, that must be it! This is the one true theory!
Until the unbelievers are converted, you might think about checking over what you've written to ferret out any misplaced apostrophes. "American's" refers to something owned by one American; "Americans" is multiple Americans that don't own anything; and "Americans'" is a bunch of Americans that own everything. What type of American (or Rastafarian) are you?
Categories: | 3 / 14 / 2008 |
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Error ID Number: 39
URL: <http://dedalvs.com/guide/search_english.php?word=39> Problem(s):- David L. Roth
5150 Mean Street
Ice Cream CA, 95150
Solution(s):- Sammy Hagar
5150 Mean Street
Ice Cream, CA 95150
Explanation:- You want a hardcore, real-deal punctuation rule? You've got it! Ready for it? Here it is: When writing up an address, the comma goes after the city, not the state. If you think about it, it almost makes sense. If you don't put something in there to separate the city from the state, you might confuse the state as being a part of the city. After all, there are tons of cities in the US that are composed of two words, the latter being two capitalized letters without any periods. Tons of 'em. Like...oh, I don't know...Chicago IL, located in Nebraska? Miami FL in Ohio? These are reasonable city names, right...?
Okay, even though there is no logical or practical reason for there to be a comma anywhere in the last line of an address, it's supposed to be there. Why? Because the government says so. And since the government has kindly stepped in to tell us when and where to use commas, they also have the right to tell us when and where not to use them—in this case, after the abbreviation for the state. So, the next time you address an envelope, remember our government, and be thankful that they're thoughtful enough to let us know where exactly our punctuation marks should and shouldn't be.
By the by, when it comes to Van Halen, Hagar is the superior singer. (Note the period.) There's nothing wrong with liking David Lee Roth era Van Halen music, but, let's face it, he's not the wheels of that hot rod (more like the exhaust pipe).
Categories: | 2 / 22 / 2008 |
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Error ID Number: 33
URL: <http://dedalvs.com/guide/search_english.php?word=33> Problem(s):- Seasons greetings!
- Seasons' greetings!
Solution(s):Explanation:- This is a bizarre idiomatic expression, since one is left with the question, "What season?" I believe it did come from, "The season's greetings to you", the particular season being the winter holiday season, but the expression "season's greetings" is strange in the way that "car's horn" is strange. What you expect is "the season's greetings", or "a season's greetings", or maybe "my season's greetings". Generally when we have a singular common noun in English we expect it to be preceded by an article of some kind. As I've mentioned before, though, expressions take on a life of their own, whether they're grammatical or not.
When you write "season's greetings", remember that it's just one season, and it's that season's greetings, so be sure to put the apostrophe in between the "n" and the "s". I think that it might be the lack of an article that causes us to write "seasons greetings". After all, we can have a plural noun without an article preceding it. In the end, we, as a community of speakers and writers, may come to decide that we don't care about the apostrophe, in which case the apostrophe-less sentence will suffice. For the time being, though, know ye well that "season's greetings" is the way it was meant to be writ, says I. Be ye warned!
Oh, and season's greetings!
Categories: | 12 / 22 / 2007 |
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Error ID Number: 13
URL: <http://dedalvs.com/guide/search_english.php?word=13> Problem(s):- Its like you don't even know it's true identity!
Solution(s):- It's like you don't even know its true identity!
Explanation:- "It's" and "its" remain a troublesome pair. The rule is simple enough. When you want to write a contraction of "it is", "it was", or have to add a possessive "'s" to the end of a noun phrase that happens to end with "it" (example: "Regarding the sandwich, the man I saw while eating it's daughter is here." And, yes, that sentence should strike you as very bizarre), you use "it's", with the apostrophe. When you're using the simple genitival form of the pronoun "it", you use "its". Writing "it's" for that one is comparable to writing "hi's" or "her's" for "his" and "hers".
Even though one can learn and understand this rule, for some reason, we sometimes type "it's" when we mean "its" and "its" when we mean "it's". It's purely a typo. The two sound identical, so it's easy to slip up. Spellcheck won't get this, so you'll just have to read over what you've written and trust (hope?) you find every instance of an aberrant "its" (or "it's"). Fun.
Categories: | 3 / 10 / 2007 |
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Error ID Number: 6
URL: <http://dedalvs.com/guide/search_english.php?word=6> Problem(s):- As an ice cream- loving American, I can assure you that— hey, are you eating my ice cream?! Stop that!
Solution(s):- As an ice cream-loving American, I can assure you that—hey, are you eating my ice cream?! Stop that!
Explanation:- When using hyphens or dashes, do not put a space after the hyphen or dash. The hyphen/dash is there to connect two pieces of text, like a bridge. If there's a space in between your hyphen/dash and the following word(s), then the little people that run along the top of your sentences will fall down the hole in your hyphen/dash bridge into the deep chasm below!
Categories: | 3 / 5 / 2007 |
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Error ID Number: 5
URL: <http://dedalvs.com/guide/search_english.php?word=5> Problem(s):- The title "Supreme Ice Cream Connoisseur" should be nothing more than that, a title.
- The title "Supreme Ice Cream Connoisseur" should be nothing more than that—a title.
- The title "Supreme Ice Cream Connoisseur" should be nothing more than that. A title.
- The title "Supreme Ice Cream Connoisseur" should be nothing more than that; a title.
- The title "Supreme Ice Cream Connoisseur" should be nothing more than that a title.
Solution(s):- The title "Supreme Ice Cream Connoisseur" should be nothing more than that: a title.
Explanation:- This is a perfect opportunity to use a colon. You've set the reader up for some small bit of specific information, and all you need to do is give it to them. That's what colons are there for (among other things). Any time you set the reader up for something specific, you use a colon to set the set-up apart from the something specific you want to reveal.
Categories: | 3 / 4 / 2007 |
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Error ID Number: 2
URL: <http://dedalvs.com/guide/search_english.php?word=2> Problem(s):- I use the word ice cream too much.
Solution(s):- I use the word "ice cream" too much.
Explanation:- If you want to refer to a word, surround that word with quotation marks. For example, if I were to tell you how I love ice cream, and how after eating ice cream I say the word "ice cream" until I pass out, I wouldn't be using the word "ice cream" to mean ice cream. See what I mean? The use of quotation marks is a conventional way of distinguishing between the use of a word to mean whatever the word means, and the use of the word as a word and nothing more.
Categories: | 3 / 4 / 2007 |
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