Friday, February 5, 2010

Sometimes it's just you and me...

Some say I should have been an English teacher, but I hardly think so.  It's just that I like the language, I like the rules, and I like things to be orderly.

Admittedly, I'm not always right - which I hate. ;-)

I've heard it said that people are either "word people" or "number people."  I work with numbers every day in my day job, but I am so not a numbers person (don't tell my boss).  Numbers are too rigid.  With words you can be creative, you can tell a story, you can convey your thoughts, you can share your world.

With my love of the written or spoken word also comes the eye or ear for errors.  Some errors have become so prevalent that they become the norm.  The digital age doesn't help; how do you learn spelling and grammar when you type in shorthand?  Will we soon have a herd of teens and young adults looking for jobs by texting - "I wld like to wrk fr u i m gr8 at wht i do."

The error that prompted this post:  here are a few pics of Bob and I from our last trip to Vancouver.   
*name and location have been changed to protect the innocent*

It should read:  here are a few pics of Bob and me from our last trip to Vancouver.

Does the corrected version sound incorrect?  Perhaps, but if you removed Bob's name, you wouldn't say "here are a few pics of I from my last trip to Vancouver," would you?  That's the easy way to remember whether to use Me or I, simply remove the other person and rewrite the sentence.

Another trick:  rewrite the sentence taking out the names and using US or WE instead.  If you were to use US, then use "so-and-so and me."  If you were to use WE, then use "so-and-so and I."

Here are a few pics of US from our last trip to Vancouver.  Us = me so you should use Bob and me when writing the sentence.

Voila.

Just don't go through my blog looking for spelling or grammar errors.  You'll find them, for sure.  We all make them.  I just needed to get that one off my chest.

As you were...

Kare

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