In my marriage, I have learned that bottling things up and then exploding later is not the most constructive way to deal with annoyances and frustrations in this life. In honor of that life lesson I am going to have a little vent.
Before I jump off into the deep end, I would like to add a small caveat to that..
In doing this I am not saying that I am perfect, I make typos, I have actually seen e-mails where I have made the mistakes I am about to correct. My intention is to advise, because I genuinely believe that some people are not aware of these rules of grammar... So look out, because..
Homophones - words that sound the same but have different meanings.
Merry and Marry
Bear and Bare
Your and You're
There, Their, and They're
And it is these last two that give me particular paws.. I mean pause ;)
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Your and You're
As a rule of thumb, if you can't substitute "you are" in the sentence, then you should use "Your." Using "your" denotes ownership. Now don't fall asleep on me here, because the difference can be quite easy to spot. Consider the following:
"_____ the best friend I've ever had"
Do you own your friend? I certainly hope not!
Could "you are" fit in the blank? Yes.
See! That was easy right? (...like nails on a freaking chalkboard I swear)
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They're, Their, and There
Now, if you've got a hold on "your" and "you're," then you're 66% of the way to getting this one too.
Think of it like this:
You & They
Your & Their = Ownership, "Is that your cat, or is that their cat?"
You're & They're = 're is the conjunction for adding "are." "You are" and "they are."
Now the final step is that pesky "there." Look at the spelling and take out the root word "here." Placement, location.
"They're taking their dog over there."
They are taking (ownership) their dog over (location) there.
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Okay, so if you have questions please ask. Otherwise I will assume that you understand and as we say in our conference calls, silence is compliance.
So please, make mistakes, slap yourself in the forehead when you make them, but at least make an effort to sound like you were awake through part of elementary school.
"I C U B 4 U C me cuz i h8 ur face" does not immediately signal, "Hey, I'd like to have an invigorating conversation with that person." It says to me, "I have a lot of drama going on, and I hit people to get my point across because words are obviously too difficult for me to use." The word "Neanderthal" comes to mind.
I have to wonder, are these people proud of sounding unintelligent? Do they read? Is it their intention to vex me? If I said that to them would they know what "vex" means?
Things like this:
1 - Capitalize the first letter of a sentence please.
2 - "Their" should be "they're."
3 - Again, capitalize the first letter of a sentence, please.
4 - "Your" should be "you're."
5 - I'm assuming he/she meant "probably" rather than "probable."
6 - The entire sentence is a paradox. Everyone is a someone. If you're "only jealous" the implication is that you are, actually, incorrect.
Check these out...
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