Pedant Mode: ON

Look, I am hardly qualified to be a grammar maven. Among other things, I pepper my writing with sentence fragments, I am overfond of use of "but" as a conjunction, I sometimes perpetrate run-on sentences that could enter and possibly win the Boston Marathon, I love to cruelly split infinitives, and I will surely be arrested one day for punctuation abuse and denied visitation rights with all but the most mature and strong-willed of exclamation marks. That said, a few things in other people's writing have been getting under my skin lately and I need to say something before they take up permanent residence in my endodermis.

"Your" is a possessive word. Use "your" when speaking of something belonging or somehow connected to the person you are thinking of as "you", as in "Your housemates would be much happier with you if it weren't for your habit of leaving your dirty socks all over the kitchen counters."

"You're" is a contraction of "you are." Yes, many possessive words have apostrophes and "you're" has an apostrophe, but the presence of an apostrophe does not make "you're" possessive any more than the presence of an apostrophe makes "can't" possessive. Example: "You're not leaving this house like that, are you? You're dressed in nothing but your dirty socks! You're a disgrace!"

"Its" is another possessive word without an apostrophe. Please do not misuse "its" as "its" has its dignity and will resent its humiliation for years to come.

"It's" is a contraction of "it is." While "it's" is frequently misused and should probably be used to its mistreatment by now, it's still not happy about it.

On to another peeve: If your place in a sentence would normally be filled with the word "me," the presence of another person does not turn you into an "I." If you would say "She gave Buckingham Palace to me," then do not say "She gave Buckingham Palace to Fred and I." You have not become a subject of the sentence just because you have someone else around to back you up. You also have not become owner of Buckingham Palace--you are delusional and need to adjust your medication.

Between you and me, "between you and I" is never good grammar. If you don't believe me, ask yourself whether you would say "I swear that evil teddy bear lying between us looked at me and growled!" or "I swear that evil teddy bear lying between we looked at me and growled!" If you would say "between us," then stick to the same case and say "between you and me." If you would say "between we," you are not speaking English; you may be speaking a pidgin or creole based on English, but you are not speaking English.

Now it's time for me to fix myself a nice cup of tea and spend the rest of the day wondering how many sad and silly grammatical errors I've made in this post.

Pedant Mode: OFF

[Edit: I don't mean to criticize people's LiveJournal posts. After all, it's your journal and you should be allowed to say whatever you want however you want as long as nobody gets hurt. What I'm tired of seeing is a profusion of certain basic errors in published writing passed along to the public by editors who really should know better.]

Friday Memes on Saturday!

The Friday Five

1. Name one song you hate to admit you like.
Oh, people have told me I should be embarrassed that I listen to Survivor, Christopher Cross, Petula Clark, Right Said Fred ("I'm Too Sexy" indeed) and others. I'm not ashamed to admit to any of those, but I was a little reluctant to reveal to the world that I kinda like Eminem's "Lose Yourself."

2. Name two songs that always make you cry.
There are none that always make me cry, but if I'm paying enough attention to the meaning of the lyrics, Talitha Mackenzie's solo version of "Chi mi na Mórbheanna" and Jeff Black's "Noah's Ark" do a good job.

3. Name three songs that turn you on.
Mmm... a bunch of songs by Icehouse have interesting effects on me. Iva Davies has such a delectable voice. Yummy.

4. Name four songs that always make you feel good.
Bel Canto, "In Zenith" (mostly for the fiddle solo)
Nik Kershaw, "Nobody Knows"
Angelique Kidjo, "The Sound of the Drum"
The Other Ones, "Holiday"

5. Name five songs you couldn't ever do without.
Only five? What, are you trying to kill me or something? There are entire albums I find essential, from artists ranging from Nine Inch Nails to Sting to Martyn Bennett to... no, I can't pick just five. You can't make me!

Right then. On to the Weekly Wrap-Up.

1. When is your birthday?
October 6.

2. How accurate is your zodiac sign?
People who think that a Libra must always be in a romantic relationship are on crack. But there are other things in my natal chart which can be seen as describing me well if you believe in astrology.

3. What do you typically do to celebrate your birthday?
Typically? Nothing. It's another day.

4. Do you like to receive presents? Why or why not?
Of course I like to receive presents! I love knowing that somebody thought enough of me to give me a gift. And I see no reason why anyone should wait for a birthday or other holiday to give presents.

5. Describe the best birthday and/or present you ever had.
Any birthday spent with friends.

(no subject)

One of the housemates is having a party downstairs. I hung out for a while, trying to make small talk with folks who're talking about their classes and jobs and lives. Fortunately most people can talk about themselves for a long time without noticing they know nothing about you, so I didn't have to answer any questions about "What do you do?" Tried some of the party food, decided that Vanilla Coke isn't bad for flavored battery acid, that lime Tostitos are pretty tasty, that pizza is always better with garlic, and that I still don't like champagne. There was a three-year-old girl here for a while too. I could relate to her. She doesn't know how to talk to grown-ups either.