Goodbye, Grammar Demons! Contest Winner Revealed

Their ain’t nothing worse then reading an email with copious amounts of grammar errors.

Did it hurt to read that sentence? It actually kind of hurt to write it.

You would think that with today’s technology, grammar errors would be practically nonexistent. And yet we’ve all been there, staring them in the face and wondering why it’s so hard to distinguish between “your” and “you’re.” This was the subject of our latest contest. We asked our community to share the awful grammar mistakes they see every day. Thanks to everyone who joined in on the conversation. The OA community clearly knows its stuff and we are so excited to announce a winner.

Congratulations are in order for Janet Miles (OA member: JanetM) of Tennessee. She shared a few great grammar errors that plague us all, and for the winning entry she will receive:

•    A Cheryl&Co.® Trick or Treat Cookie Tin from OA partner 1-800-Flowers.com

Janet shares:

“Some of my pet peeves include:

• Homophones: misusing they're/their/there (as noted in the article) and its/it's (as noted by Donna Blaisdell)
• Tense: mixing the past tense with past participle (e.g., "We had went to the store" instead of either "We went to the store" or "We had gone to the store")
• Case: confusing subject and object cases (e.g., "He gave the information to Sam and I") or, even worse, subject and possessive cases (e.g., "Sorry I'm late; Sam and I's meeting ran longer than expected" -- I have seen that in writing from someone with a master's degree!)
• Punctuation: using random strings of commas as a substitute for an ellipsis, especially when repeated in stream-of-consciousness style typing (e.g., "I'm going to the concert after work,,,,,and then tomorrow I'm getting my car washed,,,,Are you going to the BBQ at Sandy's place?"
• Parallel construction: using different phrasing for items in a list (e.g., "The University emphasizes doing good research, supporting diversity, and you should always complete your paperwork on time").
  

Two grammar oddities that don't bother me as much as they used to are the Southern Reflexive Pronoun (e.g., "Here's you a soda") and the Southern Emphatic Past Tense (e.g., "He done ran away").”

Thanks again to everyone who participated. We enjoyed reading about all of your pesky grammar demons and wish you luck in putting them to rest. Don’t forget to check back tomorrow for November’s contest which will be all about organization!