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January 30, 2007

GRAMMAR CONSULTANT

It's a long standing joke that I am rather anal about spelling and grammar. And rightly so, in my eyes, the English language is there for a reason, we should learn it and we should respect it. This one reason why I refuse to conform to text speak (txt spk), partly because I don't like to see kids growing up thinking that the correct spelling of the word 'mate' is 'm8' and mostly because I don't understand it.

Their, there, they're; where, were, we're; it's, its, its'. I know the differences between them and have the unpopular habit of correcting people when they are wrong. Yes, I'm one of those people. I also have a big thing about 'me and my friend' becoming 'my friend and I' - a cause of intense irritation to my entire social circle and beyond.

BUT, I have my uses, as was proven this afternoon when Shunta phoned me up:

"mate, "Rainbow's end", does that have an apostrophe before the 's'?"
"Rainbow's end? Yes, it does mate. The end of the rainbow."

and then in the background I heard Lucy shrieking "I told you so, I told you so", so I was put on to two year old James whilst a brief exchange of husband and wife banter ensued.

But this wasn't the only instance today.

"It was a bit of a coups" a colleague said, walking out of his office.
"A bit of a pooh?" another colleague misheard, wondering what on earth the topic of conversation was.
"No, a bit of a coups" he reiterated, and then decided to spell it for us...
"C--O--O--P"

I kept quiet.

Posted by jonola14 at January 30, 2007 8:37 PM

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Comments

So, there I was, chuckling at the Shunta debacle, when I happened on the "coups" story. I am bristling with excitement. You say "coups", which is the plural of "coup". Assuming you meant the following definition (as there is no other):
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Coups

then your written interpretation of the word is grammatically incorrect. It should be "It was a bit of a coup."

I AM SO HAPPY ABOUT THIS.

Posted by: Wibbler at February 2, 2007 9:37 PM

you are right, I inadvertently used the plural - this, in itself, is a bit of a COUP.

Posted by: Jonola at February 4, 2007 2:12 PM