I’m talking about when people say “I’m going through the 12 items or less aisle at the grocery store” or similar (“There are less apples in this bag than that one.”) If the quantity can be readily counted, you use “fewer”.
Two more things people say that I tend to get annoyed by, even though they are so common that I can’t exactly blame people for saying them;
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“PIN number”. You’re essentially saying “Personal Identification Number number”, if you break it apart. Same with “ATM Machine”, as the “M” stands for machine.
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“For free.” Free is not a price, so to say “Get X and then get Y for free” is incorrect, but “Get X and get Y free” is correct.
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Incomplete comparisons, i.e. “Lasts 10 times as long” - lasts ten times as long as what?
Judgemental douchebags like grammer nazi’s, etiquite* nazi’s and people who refuse to hire people for stupid petty bullshit, especially in this economy.
*Also spelling nazi’s.
Also this thread is a zombie just in case no one realized. And as a zombie I feel like some sort of joke about zombies should be made because zombies love jokes. Zombie jokes are very funny to zombies. Zombies go all zombie for zombie jokes about zombies. Zombie zombie zombie.
My SO does this and it will be justified homicide when I snap and kill him one day. (Not really, I love him too much.) But it’s all:
girl on TV kills herself
Him: “So she killed herself because of X? Why?”
The thing is, whether I answer factually or answer “Stop pestering me with questions” it has ruined the moment either way. And people say “What’s the big deal…” but when he’s done it ten times in one forty minute episode I tend to get a little frustrated.
We don’t actually watch that much TV together. I like to be lost in the show/movie. He feels the need to ask questions about everything.
People who don’t know how to use an apostrophe. (cough)
To be fair, those aisles do usually have a sign that says “12 items or less.” It’s the stores’ fault, not the people quoting them.
I hate when I have obviously colored my hair, like a dramatically different color than what it used to be, and people who I see at work every day ask me “Did you dye your hair?”
I have responded with “No, I got in a freak bleach factory explosion” a couple times.
I can get pissed at someone driving slow in the fast, people who talk on the phone while driving, people with too many items in the express lane but I try not to judge them too harshly because we all screw up, we all do rude things and somewhere somebody is always plucking someones last nerve.
I get judgmental with judgmental people I know too many people who sit back with their snooty noses in the air and comment, criticize and speculate on what other people do or have.
That and (oh boy will I get heat for this) people who shop at Wal-Mart.
I’ve given up on those ones. I can only get irritated by so many things, and those have fallen off the Top 100 list. 
Yeah, those idiotic, empty marketingspeak terms bug me, too. “Tastes Better!” Well, not necessarily - taste is a very subjective thing. Some people probably prefer the old taste. I think women’s beauty products are the worst offenders for this - they like to make ridiculous, un-measurable claims - “Reduces appearance of wrinkles by 50%.” How do measure the percentage of wrinkles? Measure the depth of each one on your face and take an average? And they’re only claiming about the appearance, anyway, so basically they’re not saying their product is guaranteed to actually do anything.
I understand you. I am telling you that one can correctly say, “There are less apples in this bag.”
I don’t like the way it rolls off the tongue. I prefer to say, “There are fewer apples”. But I understand that “There are less apples” is perfectly acceptable.
I believe what people are saying is: "I’m going through the ‘12 items or less’ aisle at the grocery store. They are quoting the sign that hangs above the aisle as a designation of said aisle. The signs don’t say ‘12 items or fewer’, at least not in the stores by me. Are the signs by you different?
This sort of relates to some of mine. I have a physical reaction (as in I can feel the muscles tighten ready to slap them) to any parent or adult that calls a child “Stupid” or “Retarded” or that curses at them.
On the other hand, I have the same reaction to seeing any child curse at a parent (I really wish we were allowed three “I couldn’t help it that I slapped this non-related child” cards to use with law enforcement). Any child that stands in public and throws the F-word (or worse) at a parent needs to be knocked on their butt.
I double look down on the parent who doesn’t knock that kid on their butt, no matter where they are (public, home, church, you name it)
My biggest one is people who breed any dog, cat or horse that hasn’t done something to justify passing on its genetic material (either competition, working, training levels, hunting skills). I DOUBLE LOOK DOWN on the people who do it because they’re a ‘pretty color’. I would like to see all backyard breeders sterilized along with all their animals.
Another one, I don’t understand people who cannot acknowledge your presence in an office or place of business. When I walk into a place and the person behind the desk or counter acts as if I’m not there, it seems to be beyond rude. It takes very little energy to meet someone’s eye and hold up a finger in that “right with you” sign. That is enough to make me go find another business to patronize. So, I look down on the entire business and will spend the next week grumbling to everyone in my local area about how bad that business is.
I can’t stand it when I hear someone (often on TV) say “less” when they mean “fewer.” I lean towards the descriptivists most of the time, but for some reason this one bugs me. I often find myself audibly correcting the TV character: “Fewer. FEWER!”
P.S. A thread with a theme as universal and timeless as this one’s should never be considered a “zombie,” whatever its start date.
People with tattoos;
Men who wear their pants or shorts in such a way as to expose their undergarments;
Women who wear their undergarments in such a way so as to expose them;
People who have any type of jewelry anywhere on their head except their ears;
People who smoke or use any other type of tobacco product;
People who drive golf carts in areas that they are not permitted to drive;
J.T. Gain
At hockey games:
“Hey ref you suck” at every call against your team.
There’s a group that sits up behind me - grandparents, parents and sons about 8-10. No matter the offense, these morons start “Hey ref you suck”.
Guess what?
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Sometime the ref is right. Yes, in our league (minor level professional) calls are sometimes missed and sometimes wrong. Give him a break; he doesn’t have the view of the game you do.
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If the ref is wrong, that’s part of the game. He was probably right in our favor last call. If he’s that bad, Coach will send in the tape. If he’s really that bad, he’ll get reviewed and removed.
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Is this what you really want to be teaching your small sons?
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You are loud, obnoxious and you piss me off. Please move your seats. I’ve had my season ticket longer than you have.
Citing the New York Times, you cannot say “there are less apples in this bag” or at least you cannot say it and be grammatically correct. You can, however, and should say “the police recovered less than 12 apples from the bag.” That is. when referring to a countable number we say fewer unless we are referring to a quantity that is described as a single bulk amount. Uncountable items are always less.
People, including advertisers on television, who say “begs the question” when they mean “causes the question to be raised.”