Dovefromabove wrote "Frank my mistake I didn't see the word 'take' in the first sentence of your second paragraph. Mea culpa - should have put my glasses on."
Not so much a matter of eyesight as a faulty punctuation in the misread post, Dove.
Frank wrote "Forget the four in one take the advice given by Verdun and Dove leave it to over winter then start again in spring."
Should have read something like "Forget the four in one. Take the advice given by Verdun and Dove: leave it to overwinter, then start again in spring."
When reading posts on this forum, as a former teacher of English, I can't help cringing at the missing comma in such comments as: "Lovely Verdun" rather than "Lovely, Verdun". No doubt Verdun is a lovely person in his own right (even reaching perfection after shaving) but the poster probably meant his garden / flowers / photos etc looked lovely, not the man himself.
No hard feelings, Frank.
My favourite manual on this topic of punctuation is Lynne Truss's book Eats, Shoots & Leaves. The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation. Let me quote from the back cover:
“A panda walks into a cafe. He orders a sandwich, eats it, then draws a gun and fires two shots in the air. "Why?" asks the confused waiter, as the panda makes towards the exit. The panda produces a badly punctuated wildlife manual and tosses it over his shoulder. "I'm a panda," he says, at the door. "Look it up." The waiter turns to the relevant entry and, sure enough, finds an explanation. "Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves.”
So, punctuation really does matter, even if if is only occasionally a matter of life and death.
... as a former teacher of English, I can't help cringing at the missing comma in such comments as: "Lovely Verdun" rather than "Lovely, Verdun". No doubt Verdun is a lovely person in his own right (even reaching perfection after shaving) but the poster probably meant his garden / flowers / photos etc looked lovely, not the man himself.
Hmm, I'm pretty sure that 99.9% of the time 'Lovely Verdun' is exactly what is meant
just as 'Lovely Hosta' usually refers to the Forum member rather than a good looking plant
Lovely Papi Jo
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Papi Jo, Could you define correct English as she is writ, you see I passed out from high school with very high marks in English the rules were obeyed and written as we were taught. I knew of nobody going to University from our area, it was night school and army education so forgive my missing comma's. From that time I have watched the language murdered changed and in the case of my youngest Daughter turned on its head, write the words as they sound to you was the principle at that time, spelling went out of the window, it took further education to right that wrong. You may cringe at missing comma's I look at the context of the written piece as long as it all makes sense why knock it.
This is a gardening board and all our replies were to a person asking for help, between us I think we made it clear the way forward, the answers to the question would be of far more interest to that person than whether every dot and exclamation mark was in place. Let us stick to gardening and if reading some of the content leaves you feeling sick my advice would be do not read it.
Posts
Dovefromabove wrote "Frank my mistake I didn't see the word 'take' in the first sentence of your second paragraph. Mea culpa - should have put my glasses on."
Not so much a matter of eyesight as a faulty punctuation in the misread post, Dove.
Frank wrote "Forget the four in one take the advice given by Verdun and Dove leave it to over winter then start again in spring."
Should have read something like "Forget the four in one. Take the advice given by Verdun and Dove: leave it to overwinter, then start again in spring."
When reading posts on this forum, as a former teacher of English, I can't help cringing at the missing comma in such comments as: "Lovely Verdun" rather than "Lovely, Verdun". No doubt Verdun is a lovely person in his own right (even reaching perfection after shaving) but the poster probably meant his garden / flowers / photos etc looked lovely, not the man himself.
No hard feelings, Frank.
My favourite manual on this topic of punctuation is Lynne Truss's book Eats, Shoots & Leaves. The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation. Let me quote from the back cover:
“A panda walks into a cafe. He orders a sandwich, eats it, then draws a gun and fires two shots in the air.
"Why?" asks the confused waiter, as the panda makes towards the exit. The panda produces a badly punctuated wildlife manual and tosses it over his shoulder.
"I'm a panda," he says, at the door. "Look it up."
The waiter turns to the relevant entry and, sure enough, finds an explanation.
"Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves.”
So, punctuation really does matter, even if if is only occasionally a matter of life and death.
See http://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/854886-eats-shoots-and-leaves
Hmm, I'm pretty sure that 99.9% of the time 'Lovely Verdun' is exactly what is meant
just as 'Lovely Hosta' usually refers to the Forum member rather than a good looking plant
Lovely Papi Jo
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Papi Jo, Could you define correct English as she is writ, you see I passed out from high school with very high marks in English the rules were obeyed and written as we were taught. I knew of nobody going to University from our area, it was night school and army education so forgive my missing comma's. From that time I have watched the language murdered changed and in the case of my youngest Daughter turned on its head, write the words as they sound to you was the principle at that time, spelling went out of the window, it took further education to right that wrong. You may cringe at missing comma's I look at the context of the written piece as long as it all makes sense why knock it.
This is a gardening board and all our replies were to a person asking for help, between us I think we made it clear the way forward, the answers to the question would be of far more interest to that person than whether every dot and exclamation mark was in place. Let us stick to gardening and if reading some of the content leaves you feeling sick my advice would be do not read it.
Frank.
Could be worse, folks.
Take a sojourn into some of the Facebook forums and you'll find people posting exactly as they type their mobile phone messages.
Question the legitimacy of their idle, pidgin rubbish and you find yourself accused of being the Grammer Pollice.
I do it time and again, just coz I enjoy the reaction.
Last edited: 16 September 2016 19:18:51
Thanks all, though I've not a clue what the last 10 posts were about!!
Hi Desthemoaner,
Welcome to the jolly band of the so-called "Grammar Nazis" on the Internet.
http://fr.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Grammar%20Nazi