Grammar that makes you cringe

[T42]

Shined.  Having one's shoes shined is OK, in that one is putting a shine on them, but for writing "keeping his light shined ahead", Greg Bear deserves a shiner even though he has the excuse of being American.

[JennyB]

I've seen "If you can't see my mirror, I can't see you".  Now, whether or not the driver will look into the mirror ...

The pedant in me always wants to change that to, "If you can't see my mirror, I can't see your eyes".

"If you can't see my eyes in my mirror you can't know I can see you"

[nicknack]

I've seen "If you can't see my mirror, I can't see you".  Now, whether or not the driver will look into the mirror ...

The pedant in me always wants to change that to, "If you can't see my mirror, I can't see your eyes".

"If you can't see my eyes in my mirror you can't know I can see you"

[ian]

Tip for Ian et al; "Left" is the side of the road that Brits drive on - that's how to remember it. HTH!

I learned to drive in the US (and have only driven in the US), so this doesn't entirely help.

[Cudzoziemiec]

AIUI nearside and offside came from horses, referring to the side from which it's traditional to mount and dismount, and not do anything like that, respectively. But there's bound to be someone who finds it easier to get on a horse from the right; does that make their nearside everyone else's offside and vice versa?

I'd say the motoring uses of inside and outside are counterintuitive. Why is the outside lane in the middle of the road and the inside lane on the outside?

[citoyen]

AIUI nearside and offside came from horses, referring to the side from which it's traditional to mount and dismount, and not do anything like that, respectively. But there's bound to be someone who finds it easier to get on a horse from the right; does that make their nearside everyone else's offside and vice versa?

I'm guessing that story has the same dubious origins as the one about why we drive on the left, which is supposedly something to do with the side you mount your sword while riding on horseback. Snopes probably has a view on the matter but ICBA to look it up.

[pcolbeck]

Roman armies marched on the left, I guess they just had to pick one side or the other as I am sure they didn't politely keep to one side if there was an opposing army coming up the road the other way.

[citoyen]

Again, my instinctive response is [citation needed].

[Cudzoziemiec]

AIUI nearside and offside came from horses, referring to the side from which it's traditional to mount and dismount, and not do anything like that, respectively. But there's bound to be someone who finds it easier to get on a horse from the right; does that make their nearside everyone else's offside and vice versa?

I'm guessing that story has the same dubious origins as the one about why we drive on the left, which is supposedly something to do with the side you mount your sword while riding on horseback. Snopes probably has a view on the matter but ICBA to look it up.

Probably!

nearside noun the side of a vehicle, horse or team of horses nearer the kerb, ie in the UK the left side, and in most other countries the right side. Also as adj • the nearside front tyre.

http://chambers.co.uk/search/?query=nearside&title=21st
So it's defined by the road, and nothing to do with mounting.

As for the Romans, there is archaeological evidence (wheel ruts from a quarry somewhere in southern Britain) that shows they drove on the left. But apparently there's contradictory evidence too. You'd have thought that if there had been a law about it, some record might have survived, so perhaps it wasn't considered law-worthy?

But everyone knows that the Romans, who brought us civilization, rule of law, democracy and liberty, as well as roads, drove on the left, whereas driving on the right was invented by the evil, despotic Napoleon and spread in the 20th century by Hitler and Stalin. This makes driving on the right not only a FOREIGN habit but a sinister one.

Oh hang on that's not quite right.

[Tim Hall]

But everyone knows that the Romans, who brought us civilization, rule of law, democracy and liberty, as well as roads, drove on the left, whereas driving on the right was invented by the evil, despotic Napoleon and spread in the 20th century by Hitler and Stalin. This makes driving on the right not only a FOREIGN habit but a sinister one.

Oh hang on that's not quite right.

The bigger question is which side of the road should you drive your herd of pedigree Dexters?

[Cudzoziemiec]

But everyone knows that the Romans, who brought us civilization, rule of law, democracy and liberty, as well as roads, drove on the left, whereas driving on the right was invented by the evil, despotic Napoleon and spread in the 20th century by Hitler and Stalin. This makes driving on the right not only a FOREIGN habit but a sinister one.

Oh hang on that's not quite right.

The bigger question is which side of the road should you drive your herd of pedigree Dexters?

I find your question somewhat gauche.

[citoyen]

But everyone knows that the Romans, who brought us civilization, rule of law, democracy and liberty, as well as roads, drove on the left, whereas driving on the right was invented by the evil, despotic Napoleon and spread in the 20th century by Hitler and Stalin. This makes driving on the right not only a FOREIGN habit but a sinister one.

Oh hang on that's not quite right.

The bigger question is which side of the road should you drive your herd of pedigree Dexters?

I find your question somewhat gauche.

I suspect sinister intentions.

[Jasmine]

I actually have a herd of pedigree Dexters.  And my bull is called Sinister (Ister for short).

[Paul]

But everyone knows that the Romans, who brought us civilization, rule of law, democracy and liberty, as well as roads, drove on the left, whereas driving on the right was invented by the evil, despotic Napoleon and spread in the 20th century by Hitler and Stalin. This makes driving on the right not only a FOREIGN habit but a sinister one.

Oh hang on that's not quite right.

The bigger question is which side of the road should you drive your herd of pedigree Dexters?

I find your question somewhat gauche.

I suspect sinister intentions.

Adroitly put.

[nicknack]

I've probably gone on about this before, but "get go"? WTF is wrong with something that means something like "beginning"?

[hellymedic]

When did 'straightaway' become a single word?
The DwP used this several times in a letter I received today.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Since horse racing moved to organised tracks? So several hundred years...   

[citoyen]

When did 'straightaway' become a single word?

It was prescribed that way in the style guide at my place of employment something like 20 years ago. I didn't like it at the time but my boss could out-pedant anyone in this thread on grammar matters so I never questioned her authority (this is the same boss who taught me to hate dangling participles).

[Cudzoziemiec]

I've just read a 165-page novel without a single full stop, that probably makes it sound impossible, Joycean you might say, and Joyce's Ulysses was one of the many famous literary works the narrator refers to, but in fact it was very easy to read, because even when you have a complete double page spread of uninterrupted text, the conversational style and liberal use of commas, which the narrator, because the whole thing is told from his point of view, as if he were chatting to us, only using some speech marks when he quotes other people from time to time, means you can simply treat any comma as a larger pause, if you really need to

there are also paragraphs, which stop, and start again on a new line but without a capital letter or anything like that, and some of them are very long, as I mentioned already, it's full of paragraphs which are two or three whole pages long

***

There are also chapters, which do start with a capital letter, but there are no chapter numbers or titles, though in a way each chapter tells a new story, or a new story within the life of the narrator, as all those stories are told to him by the people he meets, and he writes their stories down in a notebook, which is the novel

[Cudzoziemiec]

This made me smile:

At a conference on noise organised by the European commission in April 2017, noise was regarded as “the silent killer”, with potentially severe consequences for our physical and mental health.

[citoyen]

Just came across one of those 'why commas are important' things in a piece I'm working on - not so much grammar that makes you cringe as grammar that makes you wince:

"Put your feet up my man" vs "Put your feet up, my man"

[Moleman76]

the use of "around" when the speaker really means "with regard to", "concerns", etc.

As in, "This thread is around grammar which causes cringes"

[T42]

Not a wince but a faint smile at Edward Whymper's referring to various reverses as "the disagreeables".

[Cudzoziemiec]

Back to adjectives as adverbs and the origins or at least age of the usage:

'I'll go on,' Hypolita said. 'Life's too short to walk so slow.'

That's 1915 and British. Clearly not such a recent phenomenon.

[Legs]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-43469574

"Ant and Dec helm not one but three of their very biggest shows, around which so much of ITV's schedule is built."