It's CONFORMATION not CONFIRMATION. (Pedantic thread)

My horse is being norty. I can't get my head around that one. Please, please, please if your horse is being a little sod, say that or learn to spell 'naughty'.
 
I have often been very disappointed after opening an exciting thread entitled "Biting horse" to discover it is soliciting advice about metalwork :D

Equally, I rarely bother to open the ones titled "Bitting horse", and probably miss some great tales of missing fingers...
 
RutlandH2O said:
Interestingly, The Daily Telegraph NEVER refers to animals as he or she, him or her. It's always it or its. It makes me furious. Animals do have gender.

One of my pet hates is the use of off for of and of for off. From where does that come? And brought/bought?????? Why the confusion? While we're at it, aloud for allowed? That for who: as in "the people that went to the show." No, "the people WHO went to the show."
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Strictly speaking, the correct personal pronoun for any animal is 'it' !

There are so many of these that drive me CRAZY - too many to list here! But as a primary teacher, I am doing my best to beat them out of the children :D (metaphorically speaking ;) )
 
MrsHutt said:
Strictly speaking, the correct personal pronoun for any animal is 'it' !

There are so many of these that drive me CRAZY - too many to list here! But as a primary teacher, I am doing my best to beat them out of the children :D (metaphorically speaking ;) )
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I think I would struggle in your job not to be literal with some of the delights out there!
 
You LEND things TO somebody

You BORROW things FROM somebody


You TEACH things TO somebody

You LEARN things FROM somebody


Oh, and you scratch an itch, you don't itch a scratch!
 
Would now be a good time to admit I introduced 'uphauled' and 'discusted'?
I am thrilled to see they have been so widely adopted, that they are proving an irritation. :p :D
At work, I have found myself screaming 'fewer, damn you!' at colleagues who talk about 'less students'.
S :D
 
I used to work for a vet, and had to keep a straight face when a farmer came in and asked for some "cholesterol " for his lambs & the vet walked past me saying "just get Mr X a bacon sandwich with extra butter please" we were also regularly asked for a "satchel" of powders. Another one i keep spotting on here is "..when someone takes there horse out...." always makes me cringe.
 
Oh, and while I'm ranting I'd like to give my previous colleague a mention. :D
He deleted the word 'extant' from some text, saying that there 'was no such word'. Ah, the irony.
Then, at a famous meeting, he decided that our students were being unfairly restricted from achieving even greater heights of excellence and proposed that we should not feel ourselves constrained by the number 100 in percentages. Indeed, we ought to offer extra marks above 100% if the students did well so perhaps 133%, etc.
Luckily, the computer systems prevented him acting on that pearl of wisdom.
He's now working at Filton College - so beware!
S :D
 
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As previously said bought/brought and learnt/taught are annoying - "that'll learn 'em"

But my latest annoyance is to use "use" to describe a group of people being spoken to. As in "use lot is norty" or "I hate use".
 
Some well known phrases that have been mis-used on here that have made me smile include:

"I battered my eyelashes at him"
"I balled my eyes out"

There are more, but of course I can't think of them now
 
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