The Grammar nazi has been quiescent for some time. No glaring misuses of the language have impinged upon her delicate ears or thrust themselves before her limpid gaze. But then this morning, she read the following two sentences and had a Grammar nazi flare-up.
“Some people have food allergies. I have word allergies.”
—The Gospel According to Starbucks, Leonard Sweet
I’m with Leonard on this. I have word allergies. Some of my word allergies:
….using “like” in every sentence, as every part of speech, and to fill every space. “Like, you know, I was like, going to the store, when like this like weird guy came up to the and you know said like do you want to like go to the movie tonight and I was like yes.” (Add to list–using “you know” like all the time.)
….use of the f-word, anytime, anywhere.
….use of “God”, “Jesus” or “Jesus Christ” in any way except a reverent one.
….the misuse of “lie” and “lay.” You lay things down but you lie down. I’m not lying but I am laying down this rule.
….the misuse of “I” and “me”. “I” is a subject word; “me” is an object. “I” does things; “me” has things done to it. I hit something but something hits me. Bill and I hit something or something hits Bill and me, not Bill and I. If in doubt, leave of the other person’s name and see if it makes sense. Something wouldn’t hit I, so it doesn’t hit anyone else and I. Me wouldn’t hit the ball, therefore Bill and me don’t hit it either.
….whatever this is called….This. Makes. Me. Crazy. This is actually more of a punctuation allergy rather than a word allergy but I. Don’t. Care.
….ain’t.
Now it’s time to share. What are your word allergies? What drives you absolutely mad when you hear it? Does it drive you mad or make you angry? Making you mad would be making you lose your mind. See what I mean?
This, that and the other thing 
Y’all, can’t stand it.
Don’t get that much in Ohio–too far north. 🙂
Agreed–particularly the misuse of I and me.
I fully support every item in this post. Of course, being in a country with 11 (yes, eleven) official languages, I have had to get used to the mistakes that people make. I guess I am becoming somewhat more tolerant as I can hardly say that I speak the other languages fluently myself. One of the big problems that Afrikaans speaking people seem to have is the use of borrow and lend. They will frequently request that you borrow them something.
Different groups of people have different ways of speaking. Never a dull moment! But most of the things I’m talking about are coming from English-speakers (at least theoretically.)
Having graded thousands of papers from students with much less than average grammar and spelling, I have grown tolerant to many of the “allergies” you mention. If I were to say, however, what truly bothers me, it would center around materials written with such poor English that I cannot, without great effort, understand the meaning or that which contains definite grammar no-nos and come from professional or highly-educated areas.
Scott
I completely understand, Scott. I also dislike papers or articles written in high-falutin’ language and made difficult to understand by use of terms used mostly in that field and then released to the public. Write clearly and concisely for maximum clarity and understanding!!
Yes, and correctly.
I literally cringe when I read that someone literally lol’d. Not only do I highly doubt that they literally uttered an audible laugh, I don’t that they laughed at all, even a little. Maybe a tiny, through the nose, breathy, almost snorting laugh, but “laughing out loud?” I doubt it. Honestly, any type of “text-speak” makes me sort of, kind of, really want to lecture the offender about how stupid they look. KWIM? (I literally shuddered a little as I typed those examples). *** Please note that every time I used the word “literally,” I meant it… literally!)
I understand. Can you imagine someone literally FOTFL? A bit scary. I always have to try to remember what most of them mean…if in fact I ever knew. Having just added texting to our phone plan, however, I realize why people who communicate via tiny phones (or even tiny iPad keyboards) use abbreviations a/o don’t write much. It’s just too difficult! Thanks for weighing in on this. (I’d end with some “cute” text-speak but nothing comes to mind, thankfully.)