New York’s MTA hates adverbs.

Written By: admin - Aug• 10•11

The following e-mail appeared in my inbox, via Lisa’s inbox:

Lisa supposes this is better than running around abnormal.  I’m just distracted by the AWESOME of this MTA service.  This is why I love the digital age, typos and all!

T.J. Maxx likes definite nouns and other things!

Written By: admin - Aug• 08•11

Not to be outdone by The Washington Post, discount retailer T.J. Maxx will see the extraneous “the” and raise us two random capitalization errors!

Thanks, Dad!

The Washington Post likes definite nouns!

Written By: admin - Aug• 05•11

Dave S. has a theory about this one that I think is quite sound:

I think they meant to write, “one of the largest redevelopment efforts in suburban Washington since the World War, too.” Sadly, this made the print edition as well.

On the other hand, it seems totally possible that this is one of those “Paris in the the spring” thing and it just didn’t get caught.

Mystery for the ages!

Bread! Apples! Very Small Rocks!

Written By: admin - Aug• 01•11

We really are the perfect duo.  Reporter #1 sets ’em up and I knock ’em down.

At first I thought I was supposed to be traumatized by the lack of an apostrophe in “Tops.”  That turns out to be okay.  The real mystery is what the heck this even means.  An even number of WHAT? The noun here is “corn,” specifically corn that appears on a cob.  But saying “an even number of corn” makes no sense a-tall.  FIX IT!

LMAO, thx SMS!

Written By: admin - Jun• 27•11

Sometimes Reporter #1 can’t wait to send me photos via her Compy 386, so she texts ’em to me.  And I have my SMS program set up so that it scrolls texts across my status bar, which means I read the text she sends before I can open the picture.  I’m still not sure quite what I envisioned when I read this:

I don’t know why we have no commas, inconsistent periods, or what the hell spray they are worried about.

Ayup.  Also, I’d like to point out that this appears to have been posted on some sort of kid-thingy.  I applaud Reporter #1’s child-raising style, if she takes time out of play to express her horror at incoherence.  No wonder Kid #1 is so awesome!

Das Mauer (in meinem Büro)

Written By: admin - May• 13•11

Pink Floyd‘s got nothing on my colleagues.  When we had construction barriers, some of the more creative types around showed the world what you REALLY do with a wall.

And, you know, foreign grammar and spelling.

So many things to love here.

Written By: admin - May• 06•11

Voici:

Firstly, I love that this was submitted by Chris, whom I haven’t seen in, oh, 23 years or so.

Secondly, I love that this person seriously worked “somewhat” in to this lovely sign, because “somewhat” is a word that’s vastly underused.  That totally outweighs the “Thankyou” and “in convince” they have going on.

Thirdly, I love that Dunkin’ Donuts can get pink and orange to work together so cheerfully.

And lastly, I love the fact that when I finished reading this sign, in my head I heard the Emperor saying “This Dunkin’ Donuts is FULLY ARMED AND OPERATIONAL.”  Sometimes my brain really amuses me.

Why are we here, people?

Written By: admin - Mar• 18•11

You know how teachers tell little kids “use your words”?  I feel like that’s because words are supposed to facilitate communication.  And yet, as Colleen has neatly illustrated here, they so often don’t.

photo2

Colleen found this, for what it’s worth, at an American institution of higher learning.  Sigh.

Monday loopy giggle

Written By: admin - Mar• 14•11

Friday’s submission was Dave’s exciting discovery of a local shop that used an apostrophe correctly.  He did, however, temper his glee with this second submission.

See, the mistakes here are obvious, but because it’s Monday morning I’m going to go ahead and giggle about the fact that it’s only hot and spicy prices that are subject to change.  Because that’s how I roll on Mondays.

Thanks, Dave.  🙂

“Detective” is my middle name

Written By: admin - Feb• 23•11

…or it would be, if I were cool.  Anyway, I really like how sometimes the nature of a given error can tell you something about the person who made the mistake.  Take a look at this one that Meg found, for example.

The person who wrote the copy for this package didn’t use a bad translation program or just make a funny second-language mistake.  Well, I mean, they did, in the clunky word order and conjugation of “freeze-dry.”  But the “plane” instead of “plain” mistake?  To me, that indicates that the author actually spoke passable English.  Someone knew that the word they wanted was “plain,” and just couldn’t figure out how to spell it.  I think that’s neat.

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