Not even misspelling, but I hear people say “ectcetera” all the time. Every time I hear it, Yul Brynner pops into my head (saying it correctly).
Dear god, I have to correct people about that all the time. I have explained to so many employees over the years, young and old. Many of them truly don’t comprehend that .50¢ is a half a cent. I often find myself saying ‘decimal or cent sign, but not both’. In my mind, it looks uneducated.
Another is ‘seen’. As in “John, where are the keys”/“I’m not sure, I seen them over there”.
Honestly, I always thought it was just the way people (usually lower class) spoke and probably didn’t even realize they were doing it. But I see it typed out all the time on facebook. I can’t tell you how much “I seen it” bugs me.
It’s been happening even more with the quarantine with multiple posts a day saying “I seen a group of kids hanging out”.
I’ve never seen it except here. Doesn’t bother me, now that I know what it means.
There used to be a poster here who would use “LSM” all the time. I was irrationally annoyed. (but he never returned after a brief suspension, so I can look back with less rage at his stupidity)
I had a professor in college who, when writing, would *always *abbreviate “analysis” as “anal.” It made for some very awkward moments when he was writing on the blackboards in class.
I’m not talking about people texting (although it was really only a pain to key in a whole word back in the days of flip phones), although that’s annoying too.
I’m talking about people who are instant-messaging me from a computer, or actually emailing.
It’s obviously intended to show that the person is *so, so *busy that even the time required to type three characters is far to valuable to spend on me.
Going back to the 18th century, where letters habitually signed off with
“Y[sup]r.[/sup] Ob[sup]dt.[/sup] Sv[sup]t.[/sup],”
—was it the paper or the ink that was so expensive?
I’m not annoyed by it, but I prefer to mentally always read “af” as “autofocus”, especially when it doesn’t fit the context. So I keep reading about things that are “racist autofocus” or “cool autofocus.”
DH annoys me too. Are we really supposed to think all these guys are really “dear?” I’ll bet some of them are assholes. Someone above asks what should she call him since she doesn’t want to use his name. How about “my husband?” Is there something wrong with that?
Besides, DH makes me think “Designated Hitter” before “Dear Husband.” Which of course implies that DH is someone the wife is having sex with instead of the husband because while the husband does have useful skills, he’s kinda weak in the schtupping department.
I think they’re two different words/expressions. “Woah” means stop. “Woah” is like “wow I can’t believe it” Bill & Ted-style.* The latter can also be spelled “whoa,” however. The converse is not true.
jtru88: You said using an ampersand instead of “and” annoys you. I used it deliberately there, although not to annoy you. The movie title uses an ampersand - “Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure.” I suppose “Bill and Ted” would be correct when referring to the two titular individuals, and “Bill & Ted” when using a shortened version of the movie’s title. Either would be appropriate in the above context. I was actually thinking more of the two individuals when I wrote it, but originally used the ampersand because that’s how I’m used to seeing it expressed. In an effort not to annoy you, I changed the ampersand to “the,” but it just looked weird so I changed it back. What is your opinion on this crucial issue?
