OK, look. I don’t truly expect everyone else to have perfect grammar. If you make some spelling errors, grammatical mistakes or lack punctuation, I don’t mind. But for gods’ sakes, use complete sentences when you’re trying to convey your thoughts. Stream-of-consciousness is not a very effective method of communicating if you don’t know how to do it well.
Hello? English, please. Really, “the,” “an,” “I,” and “you” are not terribly difficult to type. Your laziness makes it so much harder for everyone else to comprehend your points. And my hints of, “I don’t understand this,” and directly editing your posts to add in clarifying words (it’s my message board) are still not getting the point across.**
*This quote is an actual statement made by the friend for whom this rant is dedicated. This quote is better than most.
**I’m hoping someone points out my grammatical errors in the above rant.
P.S. He actually talks the way he writes, but he’s extremely smart. He’s just always in such a hurry.
I’ve read it in English and German, and seen the movie in German. The only “animal” I recall was a fly that gets some mention in the book but absolutely no screen time in the movie.
Ummm. If you look at it as a non-German speaker trying to sound cool by using german words, you could see it this way:
Das translates as “The.” Our German illiterate didn’t know the word for boot in German, so he just said it in English, thus getting “The Boat” when you try to translate his mish-mash back to English.
Boot (english for the thing you wear on your foot)=Stiefel in German.
I expect he was trying to say you should put a silver knife in your boot in case you should encounter a werewolf, and didn’t realize that he was telling German speaking people to put a silver dagger in their boat in case they should encounter a werewolf.
This is why it really irks me when people try to use a language they don’t know just to sound “intellectual.” I see it everyday here in Germany in advertisements on TV, in newspapers, in magazines, etc. Some dork in marketing thinks it looks or sounds good to use an English phrase in the advertisement, and then they get the usage wrong or use a phrase that has absolutely no relation to the product to be sold. Irritating.
Is “of” really required there? I seem to think not. “All” is being used as an adjective in “all the words.” In “all of the words” it’s being used as a pronoun. Both are fine.
Funny. At least when it happens in Japan (and boy, does it ever happen in Japan!).
http://www.engrish.com/ - Japanese Engrish, your one-stop shop for Asian English mutilation.
Quotes from the site:
[ul]
[li]CAUTION! Blade extremely sharp. Keep out of children.[/li][li]“What feeling do you need the best in your lifestyle? Trendy feeling, natural feeling and traditional feeling. We’ll lead a tasteful life to find your personal style. Mild and tenderness are basic of our living life.” (Deep for a box of tissues. :D)[/li][li]“The Art of Hot[/li]Side by side, I’ll be yours forever.
Because please don’t weep.” (Poetry on the side of a paper coffee cup.)
[li]“The flowers in recollection sing a poem in sepia color. Time seems to return to the turn of it’s beautiful melody flow. Please listen to the dream a fresh heart discloses. Please look at my fresh face. Please receive it just when you open your heart. A bouquet to all of you over the world.” (What do I take to get the flowers to sing to me?)[/li][/ul]IOW, Germans don’t have a corner on the mangled English market. Neither do the Japanese, but Engrish is too funny to be ignored.
I will leave you with what was printed on the side of a Dipper Dan package:
Kinda hangs on the breeze and haunts your snack-eating ass, don’t it?
Kinda makes you wish you were nicer to Dipper Dan before you found out exactly what Dipper Dan was dipping back there.
Hey, now! There will be no knocking Engrish while I’m here. After all, fixing these bonehead mistakes is what keeps a roof over the Sublight household!
Anyway, I just found out about Matsushita/Panasonic’s near-release of a proprietary web browser featuring Woody Woodpecker as a mascot. The ad copy, I shit you not, was:
I have a friend that leaves out words in this way. It drives me to distraction. Most of his communication with me happens via text message on my mobile phone or through ICQ, and he inevitably leaves out the one word that would make the sentence make sense. I keep telling him “Nouns are your friend.”
The amount of time he’s wasted, repeating messages just to clarify what the heck he was talking about, could probably have been put to better use writing the next NY Times bestseller, or something.
