Inflected => inflexion (or, nowadays, inflection)
Reflected => reflexion (or, nowadays, reflection)
Complected => complexion
Makes sense to me…
Anyway…
I think the sign is supposed to read:
Some people lead, some follow. Which are you?
i.e., a challenge to sheep-like employees to take the initiative.
But who knows – maybe the boss prefers the other reading 
Oh, another one along similar lines which really steams my beans is the sort of advert that screams something like:
Looking for cheaper car insurance.
Then call us now…blah blah
Huh? Is that meant to be a question, or what? These kind of ads almost never put a question mark in.
Terms and conditions apply. Void where hopribited by Gaudere’s Law.
TellMeI’mNotCrazy
Tho, your thaying I don’t have parenths? I’m a bathtard?! Thcrew you!
:wally[sup]h[/sup]
You knew I was going to have to look, didn’t you? Bastard.
Please consult the immediately previous post for a clarification. 
The past tense of “pet” is “pet,” but I don’t think “petted” sounds too bad. Other verbs that have themselves as their past tense are set, and cost. Those are the only ones that come to mind at the moment.
Now. If the boss meant, “Some people lead. Some follow. You are the latter,” he should say so. Just like that. But I assume he actually meant, “Some people lead, some follow. Which are you?”
The only thing that “really” makes my eyes “bleed” is the “emphasis quotes” which make no sense. I just try to imagine that they spelled ‘*’ wrong.
I hate to ask, but can you cite that for me? At Miriam-Webster, for instance, it says "
Inflected Form(s): pet·ted; pet·ting" Does that not mean what I think it means? OED seemed to say the same. Or is this a case of the dictionary being too descriptive, or else behind the times?
Maybe people think the past tense of pet should still be pet because it rhymes with set. I know that there are lot of people who think the plural of beer must be beer because the plural of deer is deer. Nobody ever believes me that there is no law of rhyming. The plural of mouse is mice but that doesn’t mean the plural of house is hice. I’ve had this conversation many times and I’m pretty sure that’s how I will die…beaten to death by someone who’s had too many beer.
No, no, no. Everyone knows that the plural of mouse is meeses.
And I don’t mean Ed.
How about the use of ‘liaise’ to mean ‘to facilitate a liaison’?
“We’re happy to report that John, our newest partner, will be liaising the deal.”
Yeesh.
[QUOTE=TJdude825]
Now. If the boss meant, “Some people lead. Some follow. You are the latter,” he should say so. Just like that. But I assume he actually meant, “Some people lead, some follow. Which are you?”
QUOTE]
Should it be something along the lines of:
Some people lead, some follow. Which do you do?
or
Some people are leaders, some are followers. Which are you?
I hate meeses to pieces.
Every week, I have to listen to this idiot construction supervisor note that something is a “mute point.” He must have just learned the phrase (incorrectly), because he says it at least a dozen times over the course of an hour-long meeting.
LISTEN UP, FUCKWIT, THE WORD IS “MOOT”!
Not around ME, it isn’t! Argh.
And while we’re at this stuff and have the Olympics on our minds, athletes (NOT athaletes) win medals, they do not medal!
Of course, you could always tell him the correct version is Joey Tribbiani’s (from Friends) version, “Moo Point.” You know, a cow’s point of view? It just doesn’t matter, so it’s a Moo Point. 
My 13-year-old daughter is starting her third year at Tammy’s Body Motion school of dance. Now, Miss Tammy is a perfectly nice woman, and a competent dance teacher. However, despite the fact that she was born and raised right here in the US of A, she couldn’t speak English if her life depended on it!! Really, when we get the Welcome Letter this year, I should post it, just so all of us can poke fun at it together. Last year, just before competition, she kept yelling at the class “You’s all need to be more peppier!!” I swear to God, that’s exactly what she said. By the time competition actually rolled around, my ears were actively bleeding from listening to her!
We’re close enough to West Virginia that, even on the PSAs on the radio, what you frequently hear is “mammy-o-gram”. Makes me want to hold a Public Service class on the correct pronunciation! Aaaaaggggghhhhh!
I know I’m nitpicking, but they are not different verbs, just different usages of the same one. Costed is transitive, while cost is intransitive in the past tense. Hanged is somewhat similar, except there the ed form is used only in the sense of execution by hanging.
I guess a buddhist could legitimately describe it as a “Mu point”
It has been a very long time since I’ve posted to the SDMB, but this thread struck such a nerve that I had to join the fray.
I am nothing close to being an English major, minor, or even a visitor to the Language Arts building, but for some odd reason bad grammar annoys me - but usually only in formal correspondence and - especially - in signage, advertisements, or other professionally-produced materials. In short, people who should know more than I about the proper use of language I hold to a higher standard.
Today’s Atlanta Falcons/Washington Redskins football included a graphic titled “One’s to watch” (referring to players who might make the team). Random and inappropriate use of apostrophes drives me especially crazy, since (IMO) the rules for their use are so dang simple.
I’m not a true-blue sports fan, but the radio choices between 1pm and 4pm here are slim. I end up listening to various sports talk shows, and so help me 1/3 of the radio staff and guests use the term “literally” for just about everything, and never correctly.
“The Giants literally ate the opposing team up.”
“The coach literally chewed him a new asshole.”
And so forth.
Phew…I feel better.
Related to the topic but unrelated to my long-festering rant: I once had a client in South Africa for whom English was a third language (I believe German and Afrikaans where her original languages). She spoke beautiful English (along with a great accent), and I could not believe the first e-mail I received from her - it could have been written by a Second Grader. It was inconceivable that to me that someone’s spoken and written skills were that different.
A few recent let’s-do-something-less-irritating-like-claw-my-eyes-out moments:
“your posting … is offensive, confusing, and assinign.”
and then there are the — well, fuck, they’re not even homonyms, for Chrissake:
CRUMBLED: broken up into crumbs.
CRUMPLED: wadded and crinkled.
PERPETRATE: commit (a crime).
PERPETUATE: cause to continue.
ALLEY: small street.
ALLY: person on your side.