Wisconsin Tea Baggers: We Don't Need No Education!

Irony alert!

Found at: Joe.My.God.

Tea Baggers Untie!

What is it about the most jacked-up, frothing partisans among us that unleashes such a flurry of bad spelling and punctuation? I don't know, but it's hilarious.

Punctuation: Latest Victim of the "Recession?"

I wonder how much the colon, quotation marks, question mark and this series of commas is gonna cost me?

Watch Hardly Working: Punctuation Recession and more funny videos on CollegeHumor

The Poor, Neglected Apostrophe

Photo from source, TimesOnline

Back in the early days of this blog, I ran a post about the neglected apostrophe. I'm a sign-maker by trade, and have won (and lost) battles over the proper use of the little critter. And while I've misplaced one or two on occasion, I do know where they go. A primer:

- Apostrophes indicate possession. For instance, "Jane's computer." Or if the possessing name ends in an s, "James' Computer."

- Apostrophes indicate a contraction--or missing letters--such as, "it's" for "it is," "can't" for "can not" or "intern'l" for "international."

- Apostrophes are not needed within proper pronouns such as "hers" or "its."

- Apostrophes are not needed for plural initialisms or anagrams. It is "DVDs" not "DVD's."

But almost nobody gets it right. I've seen "WOMENS" on restroom signs, "VCR's" at electronics stores, and even worse, "Managers Special's" at the grocery store. And since some are so vexed by apostrophes, they either use them every time a word ends with an s, or they just stop using them altogether. Which brings us to this story. . .

[Excerpt]

Scene is set for a pedants’ revolt as city dares to banish the apostrophe from its street signs

For defenders of the apostrophe, who are more used to fighting minor skirmishes against greengrocers and butchers, it amounts to a major defeat: the day they lost Birmingham. . .

Read more at: TimesOnline

Featured Blog: The Apostrophe Protection Society

Photo from source

As a sign maker, there's not much that jumps out at me with more force than an inappropriately placed apostrophe. Of all the writing skills we are losing as a nation, proper use of the apostrophe has to be at the top of the list.

Many people seem to think that that cute little ( ' ) mark means, "look out, an S is coming!" As one example, there are the signs at our local Fry's Electronics store. Signs I've seen there include:

"DVD'S," "VCR'S," and "SMALL TV'S." I'm surprised they don't have "COMPUTER'S" and "RESTROOM'S." You see it everywhere. Nobody knows what to do with the little sucker.

I even got into an argument with a local radio programmer who insists on having "the Best of the 80's & More!" as the slogan for his station. And even worse, I've seen signs that say, "WOMENS RESTROOM," which is actually missing an apostrophe. Anyway, if you don't see anything wrong with these examples, check out the site below. You'll thank me for it!

[Excerpt]

The Apostrophe Protection Society was started in 2001 by John Richards, now its Chairman, with the specific aim of preserving the correct use of this currently much abused punctuation mark in all forms of text written in the English language.

The Apostrophe Protection Society

Featured Blog: Blog of Unnecessary Quotation Marks

I'm a bit of a stickler for punctuation. My writing here on the blog may not always be evidence. It's very easy to over-sprinkle with superfluous commas, ellipses, hyphens and dashes. In many cases, it is a question of style. I like to use italics in place of quotes for movie, TV show and web site names for instance. Other times, it's hurried writing and bad editing. Sorry.

But in my regular occupation as a sign maker, I'm very concerned with getting it right. I'm particularly annoyed by apostrophe and quotation mark misplacement. That's why I was delighted to run across The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks. Take a look.

[Excerpt]

The “Blog” of “Unnecessary” Quotation Marks

Submitter Phillip writes, "Perhaps the real question is whether this was a simple example of bad grammar by the sign-maker, or an attempt at truth in advertising?"I still have no desire to know what's in hot dogs, and will eat them with chili and cheese to disguise them further.

Read more at: The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks