#46: Avoid the crazy, enjoy the good, and chill.

[merrieeee]

My pet peeve (like anyone cares) in the grammar world is "its" and it's". It's not like it's too difficult is it? Hee!

We are half way to getting a sponsorship for a golfer at GFI so if I don't hear from any one else by about 2:00pm. we will not be able to do it as the deadline is today. Times are tough, I know.

[claytonic]

I was at a conference last month when after waiting for 15 minutes for the speaker to show up and no one in the room doing anything I went in search of the conference organizers. They confirmed that they couldn't find the speaker either and they asked me to go back to the hall and provide options for the attendees.

As I was doing this I made the same error that Ruben did and an attendee (who I didn't know) interrupted my instructions to correct my grammar. I wanted to slap her up side her head.

Shucks Cagney1950, I didn't mean to interrupt you so rudely, I was well intentioned and if I'd known who you were, I would have remained silent. Thanks, though, for not slapping the side of my head, ouch that would have hurt!

My pet peeve

(like anyone cares)

in the grammar world is "its" and it's". It's not like it's too difficult is it? Hee!

Well, I'll tell you why I care.... because it is a distraction ... it ruins the reading flow for me when I see these errors. And the possessive apostrophe definitely bugs me too. As if it is so hard to work out!!

[heinz]

My grammar pet peeve is 'they're' 'there' and their'.

Luckiest- I'll be watching skating this weekend too!!

Remember my rant about people getting out and enjoying the cold? My family had planned to go tubing on Sunday.....now we've decided not. Guess why? It's too cold!!! LOL. We want to make sure we get our money's work since it's $14 per person for 2 hours.....not sure my kids (ages 7 and 5) will last 2 hours outside this weekend.

[cagney1950]

I was at a conference last month when after waiting for 15 minutes for the speaker to show up and no one in the room doing anything I went in search of the conference organizers. They confirmed that they couldn't find the speaker either and they asked me to go back to the hall and provide options for the attendees.

As I was doing this I made the same error that Ruben did and an attendee (who I didn't know) interrupted my instructions to correct my grammar. I wanted to slap her up side her head.

Shucks Cagney1950, I didn't mean to interrupt you so rudely, I was well intentioned and if I'd known who you were, I would have remained silent. Thanks, though, for not slapping the side of my head, ouch that would have hurt!

Hey I didn't know there was a clay fan in the audience! After roughin' you up a bit, I would have said hey!

[ldyjocelyn]

I'm reading all these grammar comments -- and laughing, because several of these "mistakes" Clay made in his "Elephants in the Room" blog! Yes, I wanted to take a red pen to his "its/it's" problem...

The whole RCA thing? While the latest addition to the puzzle does make me curious (for those that don't know, clayaiken.com, which is owned by RCA, yesterday started redirecting to clayonline.com), I really don't care. I believe he'll keep entertaining me for a long time to come. It just may not be at RCA, and that's fine. Wherever he ends up, that's cool.

From the public side of the OFC:

CLAYAIKEN.COM UPDATE

01/15/09

Hey There Clay Fans,

As many of you have noticed, ClayAiken.com is now directing to ClayOnline.com. It is our wish to create one destination on the Internet, and create a unified experience for all Clay fans. We are currently working on restoring the message board functions from ClayAiken.com, and we hope to have it back up as soon as possible.

Cheers,

The Clay Aiken Team

[merrieeee]

eeeeeeeeeeee We are now 2/3 of the way to sponsoring a golfer!!!!

All we need now is $100!

[Carolina Clay]

Happy TGIF, FCA!

LOL, sounds like a bunch of English teachers reside here. As a former journalist, I also read the boards with a "mental" proofreader's pencil in hand. No pet peeves, but they do register. When we were dating, my husband said he was intimidated every time he wrote me a letter.

I'm reading all these grammar comments -- and laughing, because several of these "mistakes" Clay made in his "Elephants in the Room" blog! Yes, I wanted to take a red pen to his "its/it's" problem...

The whole RCA thing? While the latest addition to the puzzle does make me curious (for those that don't know, clayaiken.com, which is owned by RCA, yesterday started redirecting to clayonline.com), I really don't care. I believe he'll keep entertaining me for a long time to come. It just may not be at RCA, and that's fine. Wherever he ends up, that's cool.

I have enjoyed your ongoing discussion about Clay's career. I believe our guy has an astute business sense to go along with his incredible voice and entertainment skills, so I don't worry. I'm sure we will be told his next career move in time ... and hear him singing new songs SOON!

Many thnx for the hits and the comments in the MLK blog. According to the Google searches in the "Clay-less" Carolina "live feed," I have provided both lesson plans for teachers and homework for (their) students.

Mr. Caro is as snarky as one Clay Aiken, and I highly recommend the segment -- Harsh Lesson in Discrimination -- about his experiences as a white drummer in an otherwise all-black band in the 1960's. The Fayetteville Country Club will never be the same.

HEAT WAVE -- The temp has risen from 16 to 18 degrees while I was writing this post.

Have a great weekend, all!

Caro

[gbmifan]

You guys make me laugh when you talk about going outside for an activity and it being cold. The schools here cancelled today because of the wind chill. I am on the school fan call system and my phone rang at 5:30. I bet many of those same kids will be at the ski hill since we live 7 miles from it. Tomorrow I have ski patrol for 8 hours, so I better be prepared to dress really warm. I think that face mask will come in handy.

By the way put away those red marker for my post. English was my not my favorite subject, and I went to a private school that made us diagram sentences alot. Give me math and science anyday. I hated it when my children wanted me to proof read their essays!

[merrieeee]

Ok Now we need just $80 more for the golf sponsorship. to those who have PMd me.

CV has already done it so can we.

Gosh do I sound like a cheerleader or what?

[tribeca]

All this talk about English class.

Just reminds me of when I worked in a video store. All the movies are sort of alphabetic order but the most popular ones are placed at eye level. One day 10 mintues before closing a lady

took down most of the videos and brought them up to the desk. She said "I am an English teacher and am so tired of this mistake. These were not in apbeatically order." We had to stay later to clean up her mess!

Clay is going on tour with me

Clay is going on tour with I

guess it does not really matter as long as he is going on tour

Will tell you that I have a learning disability so any mistakes in grammar/sentence structure department are not intentional.

[spikesmom]

Couchie - glad to hear your Mom is doing better... {{{hugs}}}

ROTFL! This reminds me of a T-shirt that a former AI2 contestant turned current gf of a past AI winner used to wear. The front of her t-shirt said, "Yes, I am her!"

I've been reading along and getting my grammar lessons (which kind of give me the hives thanks to a 7th/8th grade English teacher that was not a good teacher - she was more Gestapo-like and terror inducing)... grammar has always been a weak spot for me... anyway, it made me think of something my folks used to tell me about when I was little (pre-school age)... they'd call for me and ask where I was - you know, "Cheryl Ann, where are you?" and I'd coming running and reply "here me are!"... so I guess I was destined to have poor grammar...

I never realised this was such an issue until I started using the internet. Having worked in offices all my life, I don't recall seeing it misused very often, but it is rampant on the net, in blogs and blog comments, forum posts, emails, instant messaging, even from people who are middle-aged university graduates, which is surprising because in the good old days, there was a lot of emphasis on correct grammar, spelling etc.. And now with text messaging being the way so many young people communicate, no one ever questions the strange abbreviations cuz w/ txtng, n e tng gos. Do U no wht i mn?

I've always been a spelling freak and hate it when I don't catch my spelling/typing mistakes. And in my earlier internet days, I'd shiver every time something was spelled incorrectly. But I came to realize that it's probably two things - one, people didn't spell well, and two, they don't type accurately or three, they were rushing to get their thoughts down quickly and post and didn't even realize they did it. I'm a good typist and I sometimes don't even realize that my fingers are not cooperating with my brain! So I'm over it now. I might pause occasionally at some of the more blatant ones, but for the most part, I'm able to move on... I've moved on to be anal about other stuff - which does not include grammar. heh.

The texting thing, though... claytonic, I had to read that slooooow... my son teases me because when I text him, I write everything out - takes me f.o.r.e.v.e.r... old habits die hard... it's a mind block for me for sure... whatever.

Happy Friday all. It's still colder than all get out here... supposed to get above zero sometime this afternoon. And then a heat wave starts - we'll get into the 20's tomorrow!!! Pretty sad when 20 sounds good but I'll take it.

[merrieeee]

eeee $30 to go!

[djs111]

You guys make me laugh when you talk about going outside for an activity and it being cold. The schools here cancelled today because of the wind chill.

When I lived in Bloomington, Illinois - sometimes it would be -20 or -25 BEFORE the wind chill factor - in fact, it is -18 before the WCF right now -

Frickin' cold in Bloomington Illinois!!!!

we would get sent home from work and kids would not have school when the weather got really bad. And we all went shopping at the mall :-O

I can still remember driving along very slowly, bags of Sakrete sitting over my car's rear axle, muttering "don't stop don't stop, pleeeeeze don't stop" to the car in front of me!

Amongst the many culture shocks from moving from Bloomington to Durham NC (I had never recovered from the shock of moving from Philly to Bloomington, really), was the shock that when the schools were closed because there MIGHT be a half-inch of snow - they closed the malls!!!!!! Good grief!!!!!

Of course, after I saw how people there drove in the snow, I understood.

Couchie, I am happy things are going a bit better, but I believe you still need many many more good thoughts and wishes beamed your way!

[FearofH2O]

Yeah for GFI. It would be great for FCA to be a sponser of a young golfer. Just think of what we learned attending one of these functions. It would really open up the eyes of a youngster.

Go Merrieeee!

djs it's still 20 degrees here in NC. Ouch! And no I'm not used to it. I admit I am wimpy about cold weather. Although I did go out this morning to the gym in capris. Since it's nice and sunny I guess it would be a good day to bring in my Christmas penquins.

[merrieeee]

$20, $20, $20 That's all we need!

[jmh123]

Amongst the many culture shocks from moving from Bloomington to Durham NC (I had never recovered from the shock of moving from Philly to Bloomington, really), was the shock that when the schools were closed because there MIGHT be a half-inch of snow - they closed the malls!!!!!! Good grief!!!!!

Of course, after I saw how people there drove in the snow, I understood.

And all the people who are not native to the area are scattered in the ditches because they don't know what black ice is. I remember one time I was feeding my boss's dogs when he was out of town, and there was only very light precipitation, like a mist, and I was coming down the hill from his house and touched the brake, and slid right down the hill into these people's yard. This kid came out and said, happens all the time, and called a tow truck for me. Whenever it was the right amount of cold and just a little wet, that hill turned into a skating rink. If you lived up that hill, you just knew that.

Snow, and winter weather, is a very different thing here than there, different dangers, different types of precautions, different outcomes. My BFF from up north was full of disdain for us until the first winter storm, and then he was like, "oh."

You don't learn how to drive in the show when it rarely happens, and we don't spend the kind of money they do up north and in the midwest on salt and sand and so forth, because winter storm events don't happen that often. People just stay home until the weather gets better, which is normally the next day. It's a surprise vacation--it's great.

This is my third winter back here, and there hasn't been any snow accumulation or ice yet. In my many years living here, the most snow I ever saw was probably 6 inches, but it's usually one or two. Now the year I got back from Japan and was living in PA, they got 20 inches of snow down in NC and everything was closed for weeks. That's really really rare.

Ice storms aren't so rare, and they suck. I'm dreading that. My mother was without power for 8 days one year, and she hasn't been right in the head since. No one could get her to go to a shelter and my brother had to go stay over there and try to keep her warm with a fire in the fireplace. Yikes.

[merrieeee]

We did it, we did it, we did it!!!!!!!!!!!! We are now sponsoring a junior golfer at the GFI

Thank you so much! I will PM payment information later today.

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

[00lsee]

Okay, teacher, I and my invisible friend don't have as much trouble with pronouns at the beginning of a sentence. It's their use at the end of sentences that seems to trip her and me.

Wilbur went with John and me to ride the ferry. (or is it John and I?)

Wilbur forgot his money, so John and I paid for his ticket. (or is it John and me?)

Wilbur laughed when he pushed John and I into the water. (or is it John and me?)

Wilbur did not offer to help me and him. (or what else?)

Wilbur got his snout punched by John and me.

Some of these problems can be solved by putting those pronouns at the beginning of the sentence. Instead of: Wilbur got his snout punched...I could write: John and I punched Wilbur in the snout.

It used to bug me when Mr. Rogers would say, looking out the window, "Oh! That is she now!" Was that actually correct? He would sometimes say, "did such and such with he and I" Shouldn't that have been "him and me"?

It is a puzzlement! (tm The King of Siam)

Also, who knew merrieeee could do the

[FearofH2O]

Great job merrieeee!

[muskifest]

Wilbur went with John and me to ride the ferry. (or is it John and I?) ME (or US)

Wilbur forgot his money, so John and I paid for his ticket. (or is it John and me?) I (or WE)

Wilbur laughed when he pushed John and I into the water. (or is it John and me?) ME (or US)

Wilbur did not offer to help me and him. (or what else?) US (or HIM AND ME)

Wilbur got his snout punched by John and me. US, JOHN AND ME or better yet, use active voice "John and I (or "We") punched Wilbur's snout."

At least that's how I would've instructed my students back in my English teacher days. I always suggested using active voice verbs and the simplest language possible first, then doing the "subject/object" test to determine which case the pronoun is. For example, in the first sentence, "John and me" is the object of a preposition so it's in the objective case "me". In the third sentence "John and me" is the direct object of the verb "pushed", but in the second sentence "John and I" is the subject of the verb "paid" so any pronouns must be in the subjective case.

And now, if you'll excuse me....my suffering after my oral surgery is getting worse from all this grammar. Now I have a face ache and a head ache!

Clay content: For someone who has said one of his flaws is correcting other people's grammar, he shore does make his own share of FU's, doesn't he?

[djs111]

jmh123 said:

Snow, and winter weather, is a very different thing here than there, different dangers, different types of precautions, different outcomes. My BFF from up north was full of disdain for us until the first winter storm, and then he was like, "oh."

Heeee.....to get home, in Bahama, I had to drive on Orange Factory Road, took a right off of Roxborough, north of Durham.

I was terrified of black ice, the asphalt road twisted and turned and went waaaay down a hill and then back up again - until they built the dam, and that was frightening too! I always drove as if all the roads were covered with ice.

When it snowed the aerial shots of 15-501 were comical, except that it was real people shooting off the road all over the place.

One time a woman slid into the ditch off Orange Factory, neighborhood guys got her out, she went back in twice because she could not understand about not flooring the gas pedal. Ended up, someone drove her car for her up to Roxborough, followed by another car - because they were tired of pulling her out of the ditch.

While the area I lived in was gorgeous, weather was a big factor when I decided to take the first job offer in Florida! No more ice and snow, Bloomington and then NC were quite enuff.

It never got as cold in Philly, and I was used to calmly thinking "Okay, I am going to slide all the way back down this hill, but it is OK because no one is behind me and I will just go even more slowly on my next attempt. No problem!"

Plus it was too hard to order unsweetened tea in NC.

[jmh123]

I had some friends in Bahama, back in the 70s. Was Fancytown still there when you lived there? A bunch of shacks with no running water, no electricity--ah, the back-to-nature days. Every summer there was a "parade" at Fancytown. There were also a few places I used to shop up 15-501N (Roxboro Rd.). A few miles north can make a big difference--I never lived up that way, but I remember that it was often snowing in Roxboro when it wasn't in my area. I did live in Durham for awhile, in a trailer off 54, and worked in Durham back then too.

[merrieeee]

From CV:

The "Something About Us" montage, which is set to go over 600K views, will be shown at one of the Inaugural balls Tuesday. Maplestik, a member of the Bolt Babes, (I think DM, QM & "Sacrificial Love" may remember her), was the person who created it. She was contacted weeks ago for permission to use it. She was freakin out at the BB4CA site. She sent them a copy of the video, but she's not sure which ball it will be shown at.

[tribeca]

Congrats

to the golfing fund (i think that's what is called)

and

to the woman who created the montage. I would be freaking out (in a good way) too

Here is a video of Eric Idle Speech during the last show in Spamalot

See if you can find Clay

[cha cha trusty]

I admit to having adverse reactions to all of these mistakes! Yes it has become much more prevalent since the invention of the internet. (a word the AOL spell-checker always insists I capitalize - why, why??)

Actually, I can't believe I left out MY pet peeve, Your and You're.....

I laughed at the grammar lessons; I'm so with you all! Many of those drive me absolutely nuts too. My pet peeve? Misspelling people's names....KRISTY Barnes. JEROME Bell. Not Jermone. It's all about showing respect, I think. If you're going to talk about someone, at least get their name right!

My pet peeve (like anyone cares) in the grammar world is "its" and it's". It's not like it's too difficult is it? Hee!

There are people out there who seem to have involuntary typing strokes and put an apostrophe before every 's' at a word ending. That drives me bananas! I withdrew the line of not commenting when one was going to publish a shirt with an unnecessary apostrophe at the end of one of the words.

My grammar pet peeve is 'they're' 'there' and their'.

Fortunately, this one is less popular somehow!

they'd call for me and ask where I was - you know, "Cheryl Ann, where are you?" and I'd coming running and reply "here me are!"... so I guess I was destined to have poor grammar...

Another funny story... when my kids were little I used to yell at them to "BEHAVE!!" Once one came up to me, and looked at me with those adorable eyes (she was about 3) and said "Mommie, I'm bein' 'have!!"

Also - we used to live on a bendy bend in the road and whenever the roads were bad, cars would end up in the yard across the street fairly regularly! One Cmas Eve, two girls showed up at our door, laughing at pointing at their car in the neighbor's yard, telling us that the neighbors weren't home. They had obviously "had drink taken" to use the Irish description! We called the tow truck and offered them some hot chocolate. Ah, the good ole days! Now we live near another dangerous curve which people miss at least once a year it seems! The results are a little more sobering, ambulances must be called as well as tow trucks.

WTG merrieeee!!!

Re heinz and cold weather/water - glad to hear you've canceled the tubing! I didn't know your kids were so small!! Maybe you could just build a snowman?

Regarding RCA and all the swirling comments - I ventured to another board last night and found out two things. Peeps think Clay planned this all along, that his contract with RCA is over and he is happy with the outcome. Now he can do what he wants.

Second thing... RCA not only closed down the clayaiken.com site, but also Clay has owned his own domain name (i.e. clayaiken.com) since sometime in October. I checked my internet ID site and this appears to be true.

My Personal Opinion - and I have been thinking this for a couple of years now - is that Clay will start his own record label. After all, does he not have (one of) the most powerful names in recording in his corner? He already formed his own production company (Fifty-two 30 - or however you write it out ) so why not his own label? It seems to be a logical progression to me. Several other AI grads have done it, well, maybe not several, but at least Justin Guarini that I know of.

I hope this becomes fact.

Another thought..... if he has his own production company, and has already bought rights to a few show names, how far away could it be before his own dream of hosting a talk show become a reality? We all know how persistent he is!

Twenty degrees here!! I sure hope it warms up before the Inaguration!! My kids will be out in it all day long! BTW - did you hear they are closing the bridges on the south side of DC? And the Gov of MD has requested that his constituants stay off the Beltway unless absolutely necessary!??

(btw - I have trouble with words that have double letters in them. I always have to stop and think how many to put in!)

OK - done rambling!! (Praying for no misspelled words or grammatical errors!!! Carry on!!