Hmmm… Subject/verb disagreement. Should read: “these are pet peeves of mine” or “this is a pet peeve of mine.”
One poster said s/he could never remember whether there is an apostrophe in the possessive. The way I remember it is to think of the other possessives; “his,” “her,” and “their.” None of those have apostrophes, either.
10/10
Like most of you said, #4 is a very poor question.
9 of 10.
I missed #4, and I’m not happy about it.
Zoe, that’s interesting. Although I’m conscious not to say “you whimpering,” only the pacing example would actually have immediately registered as absurd if someone had said "He pacing got on my nerves.
Oh, and don’t listen to JillGat. She’s answers are often wrong ;).
10/10, but I probably would have got stuck on number 4 if it hadn’t already been posted. However I somehow managed to be educated in the only years in which grammar was not taught in English state schools. And now I am really paranoid I have got something wrong in this post.
10/10.
Just say “It is” to see if it fits. Ya can’t go wrong.
If you want a real eye opener, though, read Bill Bryson’s “Troublesome Words,” a dictionary of words and phrases that are often misused. Most of them I knew, but every now and then I was amazed to discover I’ve been writing or saying something wrong all along. A few that got me:
Admit to, as in “He admitted to the theft.” That turn of phrase is simply wrong. It’s “He admitted the theft.”
A set of initials should be termed an acronym only if it is pronouced as a word, e.g. “Radar,” “NATO,” or “Scuba.” Initials that are spoken as letters (FBI, CIA, NFL) are not acronyms. They’re abbreviations.
I am pretty sure I have used the term **past experience ** at one point or another; as Bryson points out, this is redundant and stupid.
I didn’t know those things, and a dozen or more others. It’s a great read.
I’ve been called Ms. Language Person. I have friends who telephone me when they need to know how to spell words. And the misuse of its and it’s is the mostest annoying riting misteak people make.
I would like to see a quiz testing people on ‘lose’ and ‘loose’, ‘peek’, ‘peak’ and ‘pique’, ‘councillor’ and ‘counsellor’ and oh so many other words that have, of late, erroneously been substituted for each other.
Oh oh! I have some of those, too - ‘free gift’ for instance (how much do you usually pay for gifts you’re given?) and ‘six AM in the morning’ (that would be as opposed to six after noon in the morning?). And then there’s ‘fashion jewellery’ (right across the aisle from ’ frumpiness jewellery?’). Argh.
10/10
Interesting. I call non-acronyms initialisms. Abbreviations to me are shortened versions of words, like esp., etc., Assoc., and the like.
10/10. Much too easy.
“Initialisms” isn’t a word, but I think it should be.
Another tautology Bryson points out I know I have used is “plan ahead.” “Plan” means to determine a course of action to be taken in the future; you can’t plan behind, so “ahead” is redundant.
As one who lives so far behind the power curve that I usually see my ‘behind’ going around corners ‘ahead’ of me, I find that “planning behind” usually works best for me …
Lucy
Granted, that link does note that initialisms are a certain type of abbreviation. So it’s all good.
