Sunday, March 30, 2008

Fed up.

I have spent a good portion of this day proof-reading a report/dissertation for a friend. To be asked to be a pedant is a joy, the equivalent for most of you would be to be asked to view the fine collection of erotic images available, I believe, on the internet.

I then glanced at the BBC news page, and noticed a scrolling headline proclaiming that the contents of the BBC costume department were being “sold off”. Why? Why not simply “sold”?

Now look, you bastards, will someone please tell me, once and for all, what this part of speech is called, which dullard invented it, and why it has not yet been outlawed.

Because (and yes, Dave, I can begin a sentence with any word that I choose, your school rules are outdated) it does not just stop there. It suddenly spreads so that the populace feel obliged to qualify every verb thus, which leads to obscenities such as “revert back”.

And (ditto Dave) while we are on the subject, do we fill in, fill out or fill up (mainly in North America) forms? Can we not just fill them? Or not fill them if we don’t feel like it.

That’s all. I am too tired to proof read this, so you can fill (out/in/up/through) the comments section with corrections. I am going to exit out of my computer, climb up the stairs, lie down on my bed, and sleep up.

22 comments:

Anonymous said...

Please don't get bent out of shape - we'll just get tarted up here

Richard said...

The dictionary informs me that one can only climb in an upward direction. What then is a "climb down"?

Romeo Morningwood said...

Well then you must really loathe 'f*ck off'!

Dave said...

Sometimes, as a literary device, it is appropriate to use something which might appear tautological, as it gives an added emphasis.

Mostly, though, I would agree with you that it exhibits a lazy attitude to use of language.

Whenever I use such a style, it is a case of the former, naturally, rather than the latter.

KAZ said...

Does 'wash up' always involve pots?

Vicus Scurra said...

Richard - do not allow a book to dictate your life.
Kaz. Are you trying to provoke chauvinsim? One with less respect for all of humanity might reply "How would I know?" to your question, but not me, oh no.

Geoff said...

Kaz is right. Yesterday I washed up. I didn't wash.

I had a bath.

Betty said...

I have a poor standard of grammar and didn't learn about split infinitives at my school for chronic underachievers and future social failures. It's something I'm very self conscious about when I'm blogging because everybody else seems to have a doctorate in the advanced use of apostrophes and adjunctives.

"Various different things" ... that's an annoying expression.

Rol said...

Should this post not simply be called 'Fed'? Why do we need the 'Up'?












(If you even considered answering that seriously, I claim my victory!)

Vicus Scurra said...

Oh dear, Rol, why do you think I chose that title?

Unknown said...

I 'showered down' today, I thought shower up would hurt!

Romeo Morningwood said...

I love dangling my participles.

I, Like The View said...

and there was I thinking you were referring to finishing the last of your Easter Eggs, or a really delicious Sunday roast

(see, "roast" is an interesting noun, because one doesn't need to add anything else)(altho I refer the verb form involving myself and the sun)(I didn't need to add that last bit)

Dave said...

But you did add something to roast, ILTV. The word 'Sunday'. In Vicus' case, the word 'nut' might have been more appropriate.

Willie Lupin said...

"listen up" is particularly annoying and, like many of these phrases, is probably of American origin.

Vicus Scurra said...

Dave, the word "nut" is always appropriate when applied to me. And I just adore stereotypes, you Derek Nimmo sounding, jumble sale arranging, tea imbibing buffoon.
Willie. We are getting near to "meet with". I warned them. Thank you for your contribution, I enjoyed reading it up.
ILTV. I can see through your ruse to get me going again. You know very well, you naughty girl, that "roast" is not a noun. Neither are "mobile", "remote", "laptop" (that's enough non-nouns, ed.)

Richard said...

Ah. Yes, indeed. You might not think they're nouns but from where does a language get descriptive enough nouns to use for newly invented stuff? The easiest answer of course is to noun-up a verb. It doesn't bother me because this is how our lovely language evolves. Ponder: do you take something out of or from your pocket? I believe the French take something in their pocket which seems eminently sensible to me.

dinahmow said...

Improvement are not likely any time soon. One must hope that Babel's Tower does not cascade down on you. Or on us, also.

Rol said...

"Oh dear, Rol, why do you think I chose that title?"


Because you were fed up?

Hey, what do I know? I like Inspector Morse.

Romeo Morningwood said...

txt msng wl b th dth of us all!

Barry Lawrence said...

"Conjunction" - a word linking two equal words, clauses or phrases together in a sentence. A conjunction links nothing when put at the beginning of a sentence and so is redundant.
It is a school rule in the same way that 2 + 2 = 4 is a school rule. Shall we tell your pal that he might as well get his cat to check his dissertation or shall we?
You are not a pedant - the word you are groping is a few pages further on - it is "pederast".

Vicus Scurra said...

Pither! Welcome back. How nice to hear from you.
In my dictionary, pedand and pederast are on the same page. "Pither", strangely, if there were such a word, would be on the same page as "pithecanthrope".