Sp?

[desperance]

Why is it that no one on the web - and yes, this time I do include you, O my beloved LJ-friends - can spell cemetery? It's not hard, it only includes the one vowel all the way through. Got that, O internets? One vowel, and none of it is an 'a'...

Comments

[footlingagain.livejournal.com]

Ooh, don't set me off on a spelling rant....

[fidelioscabinet.livejournal.com]

I'm only able to spell it because a database I use constantly at work insists there is no A, and will not release job titles involving cemeteries unless I come to grips with the concept.

[bugshaw.livejournal.com]

Take heart from this:

Google on "cemetery" gives 4,550,000 hits
Google on "cemetary" gives a mere 372,000.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Thank you - I am actually heartened! That's significantly less than 10% error!

And yet, why is it then that every time, every **** time I see this word on the internets, it's misspelled? (Okay, I know, mostly I only notice because it's wrong - but I don't think it's really so common a word that I'm missing 90%+ of its occurrences. I think it's my friends, mostly. It's you lot. You're doing it to aggravate me.)

[rhionnach.livejournal.com]

I so can spell semetery! :-P

[fjm.livejournal.com]

I realised I had got it wrong after posting, but if I edited all my posts, I'd be here forever. Dyslexics are us.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Actually, not you that triggered this; I knew that you would know. The world is full of other people, and mostly apparently they don't.

[mabfan.livejournal.com]

I spelled cemetery correctly.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

You did. I don't think I was reading you back then, but thank you anyway. And - lest that sound glib - I'm sorry that you needed to.

[ramurphy.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure it's Stephen King's fault.

[mantichore.livejournal.com]

Mind you, he then got his just deserts by being constantly misspelled as Steven King. ^_______^

[durham-rambler.livejournal.com]

There is a benefit to mis-spelling. Our common^* friend Jeremy once pointed out to me that Plam Pilots go for considerably less on eBay than Palm Pilots.

^*I avoided writing "mutual" and sending you off on another rant. Aren't I clever?

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Actually, I allow 'mutual' in the context of friends. If it's good enough for Dickens, it's good enough for me.

[shewhomust.livejournal.com]

I'm the one who rants about "mutual"; desperance unaccountably doesn't mind.

[gauroth.livejournal.com]

For several months there was a signpost on the main road - a proper signpost, for drivers, with the arrow-shaped end to point them the right way - that read 'cemetry.' Now it reads 'cemetary.' O tempora! o mores!

[kateelliott.livejournal.com]

Maybe I misspell words on purpose just to drive you crazy. Ever think of that?

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Well, of course, it is my constant understanding: not just of you, but of the world. You're all weird and out to get me. But then people speak to me of paranoid egotism, and just for a moment it's like this cloud has lifted, y'know, and I see everything in a wholly different light, and bizarrely it seems to be me that's out of step?

Only then one of them will say 'less' instead of 'fewer', and rage descends, and there we all are, just where we were before, and I know everything that's wrong with the world and no one will listen to me...

[kateelliott.livejournal.com]

you're not being paranoid if people really are out to get you

[desperance.livejournal.com]

No, but it is perfectly possible to be paranoid independent of people's desire to get you. And having done so, of course, then a whole nother pack of people is suddenly wanting to get you, 'cos paranoia is dangerous.

And then, of course, there's that fine and writerly paranoia that overcomes us around publication time: why is nobody reviewing my book? Or buying it? Why is the whole universe out to not notice that I exist?* It's a conspiracy! etc.

*This infinitive has been split for added effect. You may continue to shop in safety; no need to return to your homes.

[kateelliott.livejournal.com]

Do you know why writers have to communicate with other writers? Because otherwise we may start believing we are the only ones with thoughts like "why is no one reviewing my book?" and "is the whole universe out to not notice that I exist?" (that was hard to type with the split infinitive)

Then we go to find out that, no, indeed, we're all just neurotic that way. It's kind of reassuring.

Kind of.

[esmeraldus-neo.livejournal.com]

Gah. I know it, and I still found some of my photos have an "a" in the titles. I am very annoyed.

[martyn44.livejournal.com]

Being driven along Finchley Road today (by a very agreeable Megabus driver) I noticed a French delicatessen. 'Connaisseure'. Which I'm fairly sure is wrong in French as well as English.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Ouchie. Wrong in all directions at once...