Literally vs. figuratively. People often use “literally” very liberally. “I literally shit my pants when I heard that!” means that you actually and factually evacuated your bowels into your pants.
Subjective vs. objective. You would much prefer that an objective jury preside over your embezzlement trial than a subjective one. Trust me.
Conscious vs. conscience. When you are conscious, you are awake and aware of your surroundings. When you have a conscience, you are able to distinguish between right and wrong either morally or ethically.
Rappelling involves the use of fixed ropes to descend a vertical surface. Repelling indicates something causing distaste or aversion. When I instructed people in technical rock climbing I often had to correct them and explain that I would teach them the former and decide if they were the latter.
Yes, I think that battle is just about lost. Still doesn’t stop me grinding my teeth when I see people talking about “laying on the couch”, though. Probably a bit unfair, because you’d be hard pushed to invent a more confusing double usage that the two forms of “lay”.
Another one that may be approaching lost cause status is “infer”, when what they mean is “imply”.
Back when I was administrating a small private college teaching medicinal herbalism and massage therapy, we had one of those huge information boards printed up so I could go to college/career days and health fairs and pimp the school.
You see where this is going, right? We all missed it - the writer, the copy editor, the layout person, the printer…
I spent the day trying to make the best of it. “Hey there! I love your shoes! Don’t you feel better now? That’s complimentary medicine. If you’d like to learn more about COMPLEMENTARY medicine, have a brochure.” :smack:
(Although I think you’re right, probably no one would have noticed. I did, though, and it drove me nuts.)
I’ve given up on the nauseous/nauseated distinction. I think that’s a “language is always changing” thing, not a true error anymore.
I think the deal with rediculous is that some people actually pronounce that first syllable as if it rhymed with me. This is particularly common when the word is emphasized.
One I encounter a lot is the difference between lack and like. “I like one more state quarter to having the full set.”
At least in places where they are pronounced the same, it makes sense, like with sit and set. But for like to mean lack still drives me crazy.
breath and breathe: When you breathe (rhymes with “seethe”; long e as in “keep,” th as in “this”), you take a breath (rhymes with “death”; short e as in “bet,” th as in “think”).
loath and loathe: I was loath to bring this up without checking it first, because I loathe being wrong. loath (without the e) is an adjective, meaning reluctant or unwilling, and is often used in the phrase “I am loath to…” loathe is a verb, meaning to hate or detest.
Prostate and Prostrate–too many people talk about “the prostrate gland.” ACCKCKKK
between you and me/between you and I–folks think if they are talking formally, or officially, or properly, that you should say “between you and I.” Those are the folks who fell asleep during sentence construction (or never learned sentence construction!) and don’t know what a prepositional phrase is. “Between” is a preposition, and it takes the OBJECTIVE form. The SUBJECT of a sentence takes the SUBJECTIVE form.
I’m talking to the wind, I know. Kids just don’t learn actual English structure any more. I bet nobody knows how do diagram a sentence!
~VOW
I am still waiting for the OP to explain how water can be organic. It can be pure, maybe, or distilled, but grown without pesticides and chemical fertilizer?
I prefer the chemical definition of organic anyway. I have always wanted to stop in our local hippie co-op grocery store and ask for organic salt, then whatever form of NaCl they present me with, say “No, no, I want a carbon based salt.”
