Jun 012007
The email introductions I get via my various dating sites at times make the cranky old English teacher in me roll her eyes in annoyance and reach for the red pen.
Or hit the delete button in horror. Honestly. I’ve read messages while mousing over the delete icon, ready to click at the first hint of grammatical egregiousness.
Sometimes it’s just that bad.
I know I’m a grammar snob, and I don’t get terribly particular about little slip-ups. But the bigger stuff? It makes me weep.
Read and mourn with me:
- We need to play im so board right now i would love to play tonight! (Baby, you are going to have to do better than that. I don’t “play†with people who want to be with me as an alternative to boredom. If you are that bored, watch some tv. Read a book. Do a crossword puzzle. Grab a dictionary and learn the difference between “board†and “bored.†Sex to alleviate boredom? No thank you.)
- I think we could get a long good, I’ve included my profile. If your intristed (which I know you will be), drop me a line. (Wow. He’s reading my mind after viewing a few sentences about me. I should be impressed, but I’m so not.)
- Let me give you something to wet you’re appetite! (Blinding pain! Delete! Delete! Delete! I prefer my appetite to be completely, utterly dry.)
- You peek/peak my interest! (No. No I don’t. Trust me on this one. I don’t.)
- I know you said you can’t host, I got a sweet little flatbed truck, I was thinkin we could take it out for a ride in the country and do it on the flatbed. Does that sound good to you? (Actually it doesn’t. Sorry.)
- Saw your profile and I think you deserve a chance to get to know me. (While this is not strictly an example of lousy grammar, it’s so horrible that I had to include it here. I wanted to respond with this: “For the love of God please don’t try any further to inflict your wonderful-ness on me.†Instead, I held in the snark and simply hit the “not interested†button.)
And finally, my all-time least favorite:
- Want me to masterbate for you? (Misspelling “masturbate†in this manner is like fingernails on a chalkboard. Please get it right. We all do it. Learn to spell it! I’m thinking that this word really should be on spelling lists–monthly, at least!–starting in elementary school. It’s just that important.)
Turn me on with good grammar, baby. Please. In the comments. Make me hot. Go!
————
PS–Swag. Tomorrow. Be here.
It’s good to know I’m not the only one :) That kind of second grade non-grammar makes me crazy! For criminetly sakes if you’re trying to attract someone, make a real effort to NOT be a total ass!
Get out your ruler AAG – there’s some knuckles that need whacking!!!
Quote directly from our profile:
“One final note: If you are going to write us, please be articulate. We can live with the occasional typo but will no longer bother to even reply to a contact if there’s no indication of intelligent life behind the keyboard. Thank you for understanding.”
I just got this message RIGHT THIS VERY SECOND:
i would love too get to know you im up there alot and single
See? See what I mean? Gah!
You pique my interest. But I won’t masturbate for you. I do that entirely for myself.
Well… mostly. There is this one guy…. but that’s another story. hehe
Your so pecky. U think your so speshul? Girlz like u needz sum punishmint for ur atitood. U want sum? I am up in you’re area a lot; lets get tagethr.
(I wonder if the “you deserve to know me” guy was being tongue-in-cheek? If so, that’s kind of funny.)
my speeling I know isnt that great sometimes…and I use elipses (I think that’s what the three dots indicating a pause are?) waaaayyy more than I should, and punctuation sometimes just seems like a hassle. these factors I all chaulk up to lazyness. if I was trying to get into the pants of a lady with half a brain tho I would definitly put in a little more effort.
I truely think some people actually don’t know how to form coherent sentences when writing.
Oh lets not forget when cruising the web and random myspace pages and people type WiTh EvErY 0tHeR LeTeR CaPiTaLiZeD. That shit makes me want to hit them over the head with a shovel and bury them in the woods behind my house. Oddly enough its usually teenagers…crazyness huh?
I completely understand your pique with the use of incorrect homonyms.
It always piques my interest to have a peek while helping her peak.
Hmm, I can’t look at your photos in a bigger version anymore. Is that deliberate? And is that mint in this photo?
I’ve been a lurker here for a while now, but I saw the picture on this post, and I just have to step out of the internet shadows to ask a question…
What plant is in the picture?
I have one that looks just like it growing outside, and I have no clue what it is. I call it “Mystery Plant.” ha!
Please let me know if you get the chance. Thanks! (I love reading your posts!)
Vincent and I are both grammar snobs like you (meant as the highest of compliments, I assure you.)
It seems to me that on a site where your writing is the first thing people know of you, you’d put a little more effort into it, lest you look like a complete and utter moron.
Miss Syl, your comment made me laugh out loud and Ax, your pique/peek/peak was very, very clever.
On a different note, because of your review, I bought the Blueberry Buzz (that was me who sent you a message on MySpace, by the way.) It came in the mail today and I can’t wait to try it!
I know your (NOT ‘you’re’) pain. Now I wish I had saved the eager response on MyPage. But it was just so horribly painful. So pretty, and yet, not smart enough to be counted as human.
(My goal here is to touch upon all of the grammatical errors you cited…)
I think we could get along very well, if you’re interested. You have really piqued my interest, and I would love to try and whet your appetite. I would hate to think of someone so intriguing as your profile suggests sitting home bored, when we could be watching each other masturbate, learning what turns each other on while holding out on touching each other just a little bit longer before finally letting our passions take over.
(Sorry, I just couldn’t manage to work the flatbed truck in there anywhere. It was too painful to focus on, made me think about my hick roots growing up in Oklahoma…)
AAG: this post again: the picture is 3000×2400 pixel. Yes, it’s shown as 253×201 pixel, because that’s what you specified as the display size in the HTML – but the file is still 3000×2400 pixel, as you’ll see by doing right-click ? View Image. And it’s 3.5MB. Every visitor to the page is snarfing down 3.5MB where 100KB would suffice.
Dear Mr X.
My personal view is that people with your blend of cockiness, ignorance and rank stupidity should be denied all sexual contact with females until these problems are certifiably rectified.
In this way Darwinian principles will ensure the eradication of your sub-species within a generation, for the overall benefit of humanity.
With kind regards,
AAG
AAG,
The issue with bad grammar in no way ends at meetup sites. I am an old hand at the various types of internet addiction, from IRC to online gaming, and the grammar problem is everywhere. Just last night I was playing an online game and I had to shut down at least three of the chat channels which are built into the game in order not to have myself reported to moderators for the offensive responses I was about to make.
I’m not perfect, far from it, on the grammatical scale, but I have to agree with you concerning word choice as well. In many cases it is as if the morons who are out there, as supposedly functionally literate adults, have never previously been exposed to the English language in any sort of proper fashion.
To an extent I think the internet is making the problem worse as well, due in no small part to the tendency among chatters to abbreviate every goddamn syllable of anything they write, rather than avoid the lazy man’s response and type out what they want to express.
Sorry I rambled a bit there, but this is a peeve of mine.
And great blog. I stumbled across you the other day and I’ve read almost obsessively since.
I wholeheartedly agree with you. If a prospective date cannot even take the care to present himself well in writing it does not bode well the actual meeting.
Who in the world thinks that talking about their flatbed truck is a good opening gambit? Do people actually think before they hit the “send” button?
I’m always afraid of making grammatical or spelling mistakes in things that I post, either on blogs, on forums, etc. I can almost feel the ghost of my high school English teacher hovering over my shoulder. And that frightens me, because she was really stinky, even in real life!
Does careless grammar presage careless loving? I trust you’d rather not find out!
Here’s a good response to all of them:
“Ooo baby, let’s get together and split some infinitives.”
What about bad grammar spoken in the heat of passion? Can you say “buzz-kill” ?
By the way; I thoroughly recommend the book: “Eats, Shoots & Leaves” by Lynn Truss. A very funny look at misplaced punctuation. My OCD 16 year old daughter got a copy last year from me. At least look it up to see the cover illustration.
I’ve gotten a good number of those. Mostly I ignore them if they don’t use proper English. I have a problem with masturbate and clitoris myself. Even though I write stories with both of those month after month, I still need a spellchecker every single time.
Your wonderfulness knows no bounds. A woman who appreciates good grammar and spelling is priceless. I should know, I married an English major.
As bad as it is to receive such drivel from prospective dating partners, it’s even worse reading it at work, from supposed professionals.
Hey, I think we can actually start the list of things that DON’T turn AAG on–doing it on a flatbed truck goes at the top of the list! It’s a pretty short one so far, I think.
AAG, you have always turned me on but today’s column was the top! Thank you!
Don’t ya just looove people?
I’ve read Eats, Shoots &Leaves. Thank you!
See, doin’ it in the back of a flatbed truck does sound kind of hot. Just not on the first date.
:)
im gonna trye to doo my best..
aag wont chew b mine . i know ewe and i can get off lots uv times. i promis u that u wont want 2 git out uv my bed cuz i am so gud you wud be beging me to mak u cum over and ovr.
i yam vry romanstic and wil hav flowrs and whine and whiped creme plus the best choklit fuge you never had. i wil lik it of of u and u wil lik it of of me and then we wil showr and chang the shits and start ovr agin. we wil do mor things to but i am to shy to tipe them.
i git horney jist typin to u so hury up ad say yes cuz my slik pikup chik pikup is alredy to go.. jist lik i am.
i hop u dont mind cuz my spel cheker dosnt work on ur blog.
Sensitive Man,
You think you are exaggerating.
Actually, that looks completely typical.
:)
Hi AAG,
Boy, you better not go read Madame X’s page today! ;-)
XOXOXO
Chuck
Edge,
For some reason your comment got snared in the spam filter.
I’m taking down the pix for now until I figure out a simple way to make them load correctly.
Thank you very much for ‘splaining this to me.
aag
I love it when you have your panties all in a bunch.
Fortunately, most of those meatheads don’t blog or we’d fix’em right up!
kiss from us,
Him
Oh, forgot to mention…I don’t know what the plant in the picture is. It’s not mine. Wish I could help!
AAG,
It always helps to be a tad litterate… And using spell-check occasionally certainly counts…
Oh well, just a way to weed out the ‘no thanks’ from the ‘possibles’…
If you find one good one out of 500, that ratio seems about right… Internet fishing isn’t the best of ponds… Too much scum, and not enough healthy fish…
Thank you for this blog. It should be required reading for all potential cyber “dates.”
I refuse to correspond with anyone that writes like the old Evelyn Wood course, “If u cn rd ths.”
AAG,
The clitorical positivitudinous you masturborize for your vaginal multitudinese is seminally orgasmitraneous!
Pluff
There are times, albeit few, when I am writing someone and in the heat of the passion, I will skip some punctuation, hoping that, in the speed of my response, the reader will detect just the right amount of quick wit and repartee.
And if, in the case of a positive response from my first missive, I will sometimes let lapse proper diction in the idea that an honestly horny word will prove better suited than an Oxford graduated 10 dollar word.
And than, if she is still intrested, I might sometimes miss spell words cause I am so damn intend on getting into her panties, that I am just plane thinking with my dick insted of my brain and if she can just forget all that intelligent shit until after I get off…than we can start over with a conversation more suited to the educated individuals we both are.
Otherwise, I totally agree with your angst.
Ronan,
Yes. Oh yes.
:)
AAG,
When one is trying to get in your pants, one should eschew obfuscation and be direct. Not only should they be direct, they should be grammatically correct. They should employ great accolades when communicating with you and be resolute in their determination. Ergo, they should indicate through their use of the English language more than the size of their private appendages. They must demonstrate through prose their admiration of you and your many desirous traits.
Pete
Pete!
What a very large vocabulary you have!
Rrowr!
Deere Alawys Arouned Grul,
Im want too FUCK u & cam on ur FACE! durty SLUTE!
Suk my CUCK!
I’m not going to proposition you, AAG… I will say i’m with you all the way. ‘You deserve the chance to get to know me better’ made me think somehow of the ‘perfect’ guy… You know… Don’t touch the hair, you’ll wrinkle the shirt.
Mr. Flatbed needs to work on his delivery: “No bed, but I got a truck!”
What happens if you already have ‘a long good’?
aag,
I know it is impossible for us virile males to truly understand what you must go through as an available, sensual, exciting, arousing and aroused woman… a woman who has just a small bit of tease in her character and in her posting.
… Nevertheless, we must try.. or should try, especially if we want the best sex of our lives. “Hello. How are you? Won’t you fuck me right now” probably only gets the author a boring quickie some of the time.
Anyway, a year ago, I decided to try to learn a little more of what it must be like from your side of the equation. … So, I posed as a n available and interested female on a chat site to see what would happen…
… and wow!!… I was amazed!! The blither, and blather, the rude come-ons, the grammar-less come-ons just blew me over.
… not to mention the total lack of creativity or sense of the quest.
Perhaps I can help Dausa:
‘I am fortunate enough to be the owner of a conveyance which might have been designed expressly for the practice of the arts of love. Might I dare hope that, as our friendship blossoms, you might be persuaded to share those pleasures with me?’
I think that sounds rather better than ‘…doin’ it on the flatbed’.
“Come on, doesn’t it sound HOT to do it in the flatbed?
It does, doesn’t it?”
i aint got a faltbed butt the pickup is hott n reddy 2 go
You guys are flippin’ funny.
Come on, doesn’t it sound HOT to do it in the flatbed?
It does, doesn’t it?
Same here – no flatbed for me, but I do have a nice little pickup that I can vouch for the comfort of. ‘Course, it was a LONG time ago that I tested it out… wanna help me double check my memory?
(seriously, the whole thing about intelligent life behind the keyboard? It has cut WAY back on the idiotic emails and pumped up the intelligent ones that might have otherwise passed us by due to whatever physical flaws.)
It’s a GIRL!
My Lord!
In a flatbed Ford,
Flashing her titties at me!
(or something like that)
The worst news is that these morons will suggest the same thing in a month. They forget who they have offered themselves to after a few beers and will start thru the list again hoping that they will find some desperate cow that will accept their bid.
aag:
Maybe your ad should include the following:
I am seeking a man who wantonly dangles his jewels, not his participles.
Kochanie
I dunno,
I’m still intrigued by the offer to “get a long good”
sounds better than getting a short good!
but a good what?
Shay,
I do love me some long good.
:)