I’ve got one request when I’m dead. If you’re going to write a plaque and pay big bucks for it, can you at least do a grammar check? I don’t want someone ruefully pondering this in a half-baked blog somewhere.
I’ve got one request when I’m dead. If you’re going to write a plaque and pay big bucks for it, can you at least do a grammar check? I don’t want someone ruefully pondering this in a half-baked blog somewhere.
How about "I'm dead", not much to go wrong with that, although maybe the apostrophe. Anyway, the way that spelling is going in 50 years time nobody will notice.
Ken, I know what you mean! Nothing wrong with keeping it simple.
In my post about Carlsruhe Cemetery, I've got a photo of one of the better lines I've seen on a headstone, 'See I told you I was sick'. Okay, I reckon he should have included a question mark after 'see', but you can't have everything. I can't criticise too much though, as grammar always trips me up.
When I looked at this headstone, I wondered if the stonemason was just given some words and copied them or he ballsed it up?
Oh, I know spelling can be a bit scrappy these days, but I've got a photo of a 'ye olde' headstone with a beauty of a stuffed up word. I might have to find it and place it in this months pictures!
Imagine when (if?) the FaceBook generation grows up. You could be looking forward to a headstone like this: "WHY DID U HAVE 2 GO GREGGGGG??????? BUT U LIVED LIFE TO THE FULLLLLLLL (THATS Y U FELL OFF THAT CLIFF LOL)!!!!! ANYWAYS YOLO BRO C U ON THE OTHER SIDE!!! BE COOOOOL LUV U 4EVERZ ROTFL. XXXXXXX."
Ha! Nice work and I especially appreciate the capitals! Shouting from the grave to any chump walking past?! Mind you, I really do need to include the photo of the old grave I found with an entertaining spelling. I've just got to find it amongst my million pictures haphazardly stored on external hard drives 🙂
My daughter has dyslexia so I've seen some pretty unusual spelling mistakes in my time! 🙂 The invention of the computer and spell-check has made a huge difference to these intelligent but often spelling challenged people who are wrongly labelled as stupid. I wonder what happened when the family noticed the mistake?? With a bit of luck they were all dyslexics and didn't notice. You would think that if it was the fault of the engravers they would have had to replace it, so perhaps it was a family member? I'm glad it wasn't me. I make enough mistakes as it is. 🙂
It's not a spelling story but it's kind of related. I learned to read when I was very young, before I was exposed to the proper pronunciation of many obscure words. I often used these words in conversation and was unaware that I was saying them wrongly until years later. For example, for hyperbole I would say "hyperbowl". At least my mistakes were kind of phonetic. 🙂 It was a little embarrassing. I knew a lovely lady once who always said eminent instead of imminent when referring to the approaching birth of a new goat kid on the farm. She also said she planned to marionate instead of marinate the meats. And her dear old hubby said he drugged the log instead of dragged it. It would often make me smile. Sometimes it's the mistakes in the world and not the perfections which can give us the most entertainment. Another interesting pic. Thanks. Jane
In my experience of doing my dad's plaque, it's a matter of writing out what's required, adhering to the specifications of the plaque. Sentence length etc. At a wild guess, I reckon the family wrote the incorrect spelling and the stonemason just copied what he'd been given.
At the time, I was reading the message and thinking, 'there's something not right there', but not automatically noticing it. It's only when I thought about it more and realised, 'hang on, comfortly isn't a word!'. It's one of those words where you hear people say it that way, so that's the way it goes.
You'd think there would be a bit of a grammar checker with these things though, as a headstone like that one would have cost a lot of money. Dad's was a simple lawn plaque with a photo and that cost $1200, so I can only imagine how much a big, flash headstone like this would be. You'd think someone would be all over it, making sure the writing makes sense before it's made. Oh well…
We all make misteaks from time to time …
Definately! 🙂