Win a free gift from the head honcho!

So, did you really think you were going to win a free gift? Think about that. A free gift? Have you ever gotten a gift that wasn't free? Of course not. And win? Well, you can't very well win something that's given to you -- for free. Right?

Welcome to today's topic: redundancies. And this one is a group effort. Please feel free to add your own, because I know I'm only scratching the surface. OK, here goes:

head honcho: honcho means leader, so ...

Please RSVP: The translation of RSVP is repondez s'il vous plait, the last three words of which mean -- you guessed it -- please.

close proximity: Yep, proximity means close.

my own personal: Thrice redundant?

In addition ... also: As in "In addition to being a language snob, I'm also a chocolate snob (no Hershey's for me, thank you)."

And now the self-explanatory:

PIN number

ATM machine

GPS system

On a somewhat related note, have you ever noticed the redundancy of the sheet of plastic covering a slice of American "cheese"?

Can you spot the errors?

The following was printed on the packaging of the Star Wars fishing rod that my 8-year-old bought at a garage sale (because nothing says fishing like Star Wars, right?).

So ... how many errors can you spot? My count is four, but two are of the same kind and are more subjective than the others. Take a stab and then look below for my corrections (or don't ...).

1. Kid's: Kid's is the possessive form of kid, not the plural, which is needed here: kids. In editing circles this is called the grocer's apostrophe because it's so often seen on signs advertising, for example,  apple's for $2.99/lb. 


The only reason I can come up with for grocers and manufacturers of Star Wars fishing rods believing this is correct is that they think the noun needs to be separated from the "s" ... for, I don't know, easier reading? I mean, are you really that confused when you see the word apples, having to stop and think, "Oh, it's apple but the "s" on the end means more than one apple"? Didn't think so. Please use the apostrophe only when indicating possession (My kid's Star Wars fishing rod is all that) or contraction (My kid's been playing with his Star Wars fishing rod all day -- here the apostrophe replaces the missing letters "ha" from has).

2. help any kid build their angling skills: Kid is singular; their is plural. So they don't match. And they should: "help any kid build his or her angling skills" or "help all kids build their angling skills." This is another battle we editors are fighting: the trend of accepting their as an appropriate possessive pronoun for a singular subject.

3. and 4. "easy to use push button design reel": Don't be afraid of the hyphen, even multiple hyphens: easy-to-use push-button-design reel makes this an easier-to-read sentence. You could also delete design. Plus -- and not being a fisherperson I may be wrong here -- aren't all reels the push-button kind?

How'd you do?

Plethora o' peeves

My former-hubby-now-husband (whose father hates the word hubby) alerted me to this list from the 6th Floor, a blog of the New York Times Magazine:

http://6thfloor.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/05/26/words-you-dont-say/

If I may point out my favorites:

• anxious/eager. See my earlier post on this topic.
• behaviors/insights. When, and why, did these become plural?
• chaise lounge. This is INCORRECT. As much as I wish I spoke French, I don't. Yet. But I do know this much: the term is chaise LONGUE and it is pronounced something like this: shez long. It means long chair, not lounge chair, although it's obvious why this confuses people. 
• closure. You may get closure by confronting that jerky boyfriend who dumped you, but when we have 3 feet of snow, you get school closings and road closings.
• comprised of. No. It's comprise or composed of. Comprise means to encompass or include, so a zoo comprises animals or it is composed of animals but it is not comprised of animals.
• deplane/detrain. Um, last time I checked, plane and train are not verbs. Therefore, neither are deplane and detrain. The flight attendants don't say, "Have your planing passes ready before you plane." So why do they say, "Make sure you have all your belongings before you deplane"? Something wrong with exit?
• disinterested/uninterested. This one I learned from my husband. If you're bored out of your mind in a work meeting, you are uninterested. If you have no stake in the group that's meeting or the business they're conducting, you are disinterested; you're neutral, unbiased.
• enormity. This has nothing to do with size. That would be enormousness, or better, magnitude. Enormity refers to outrageousness. 
• farther/further.  Farther indicates actual physical distance: I live much farther away from the equator than I'd like to. Further is for more metaphorical use: I do not want to explain any further why I still live in a place with nine-month-long winters.
• gift (v.). This is WHAT you give someone, not how you do it. You give it. You give the gift. We do not need a new word for this.
• intensive purposes. If people who say this would just stop and think about it, they would realize it doesn't make sense. The phrase is "for all intents and purposes." (Which, now that I think of it, is kind of redundant. Why don't we just say "for all intents"?)
• irregardless. Not a word. You are likely confusing irrespective and regardless, which can be used interchangeably but which should not be merged to form a new nonsense word.
• literally. Most of the time, I hear this used to mean figuratively, which is its opposite. If you did not actually have molten flesh dropping on the ground in front of you during yesterday's heatwave, you can't say, "My face was literally melting off!"
• penultimate. It simply means next-to-last. December 30 is the penultimate day of the year.
• signage. Why do we need this word? How does it differ from signs?
• towards. This is British usage. Here in the U.S. it's just toward.
• unique. Yes, something can be unique, which means one of a kind. It cannot, however, be "kind of unique" or "very unique." That's like being kind of pregnant. Either it is or it isn't. 
 

Please feel free to share your favorites too!

"Don't" read this

So, what you're really saying is that you don't sell boxes?

Save the complements

Compliment your new cut with 50% off a color & foil - Only $25

Half off color tint and foil - only $25 ($50 value)

I found the above in my email inbox the other day from a certain daily-deal outfit with a perplexing logo (my Facebook friends know which one I'm talking about).


Two things here: 
1) No, you're not complimenting your new cut — that would be to say, "Gee, new cut, you look great!" Rather, you are complementing your new cut, meaning you are completing or enhancing it. With a color tint. 
2) Isn't color tint redundant?


(Actually, there's one more thing: the hyphen used as a dash. Stay tuned for more on that peeve.)

Everyday gripe

I see it every day. Every. Day. Two words. What I see, as in the photo below, is the one-word spelling where it should be the two-word spelling.

Everyday is an adjective. Every day is an adverb. If parts of speech don't mean anything to you, then think of it this way: everyday means ordinary, common, usual. So the sign in the picture is saying "Available ordinary," which is, of course, nonsense. Everyday should come before a noun that it modifies, e.g., I'm not getting out my good china for the in-laws; the everyday dishes are good enough for them.* 

Every day, on the other hand, is what you should use when you're referring to when something happens, like when flu vaccinations are available at the neighborhood pharmacy. They are available every day. (Even in May, it would seem ...)

Practice the proper use of these two terms every day, and you will elevate yourself above the everyday writers out there.

* Just a test to see if any of my in-laws are actually reading this.  :)

Don't lay to me

Ready for my biggest pet peeve? Lay vs. lie. Why? Because I don't think it's that hard. I mean, if I can get it, anyone can. Yes, I'm a word geek, but people much smarter than I get this wrong all the time. But let's not make this a judgment about intelligence. (After all, my money-geek friends are probably saying, "I can't believe Anne doesn't get the concept of compound interest!") Let's just try to make this easy for everyone.

I think so many people get this wrong for one of two reasons: 1) they get confused because lay, while having a different meaning from lie, is also the past tense of lie; or 2) they think lay and lie are interchangeable and it's just a matter of how you choose to pronounce it (like EE-ther vs. EYE-ther for the word either).

Whatever the reason, here's the scoop. (And while many rules of English grammar are not black and white, this one is.)


Lay means "to set" and requires a direct object. (Please lay the book on the table.)


Lie means "to recline." (I'm going to lie down for a nap.) 


When you move to past tense, it gets trickier:

Yesterday, I laid the book on the table.


Yesterday, I lay down for a nap.


And you will almost never hear the correct past participle used:

For the last few days, I have laid the book on the table.


For the last few days, I have lain down for a nap.


Ever hear anyone say "lain"? Didn't think so. No matter. YOU can be the first. But, really, for the most part, if you just concentrate on mentally saying "set" or "recline" before you utter either L word, you should be OK. And your word-geek friends will love you for it.