I hate the word commentate too. I was totally agreeing with that caller. *sigh*

Just because it’s correct, doesn’t mean I have to use it!

Wow. “Certificated” is a new one on me! Thanks for the info.

In response to the post about Candian usage of dinner and supper:

My family spends summers on Prince Edward Island, home of Anne of Green Gables. People there do in fact refer to their noontime meal as dinner and the evening meal as supper. I don’t think I ever heard lunch being used on PEI. Granted, our home is ina very rural region, where many people are still farmers, and most families used to be if they aren’t now. It may be that different terminology is used in the (two) cities on PEI.

I’m pretty sure I’ve also heard it used in Maine, so if it is a regional difference, it could be maritime Canada, spreading into the northeasterjn U.S. I don’t think it goes as far as Massachusetts, though. I grew up there, and ate breakfast, lunch, and then dinner or supper, used interchangeably. After noticing the difference on Prince Edward Island, I came to the conclusion that others on the forum have expressed, that supper is the evening meal and dinner is the biggest meal of the day, regardless of time. Since then, I’ve used supper for the evening meal, and dinner has mostly dropped out of my speech.

In the early seventies, I visited the Lodge of the Four Seasons at the Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri. The front and stock report pages from the Wall Street Journal (I think) were posted on bulletin boards above the urinals.

So a man could check his stocks while he was , er, “checking his stocks.”

Emmett

Emmett Redd sedd:
So a man could check his stocks while he was , er, “checking his stocks.”

Gosh, Emmett, that actually makes more sense now! I wonder if that might be a possible origin.

Hmm. Interesting.

Regarding Biweekly and Bimonthly.
I heard somewhere that the use of Bi- as twice a week or twice a month probably came from the doctor’s prescription shorthand
“bid - bis en die, twice each day “

I long ago stopped using the term because of the possibility of misunderstanding, and will always email or call to verify what someone wants. (I once had in one day, two memos from the same person wanting biweekly meetings for two different projects, one was for twice a week and the other was for every other week.)

amcrory said:

Thought of a pretty common exception to the “periods and commas always go inside the quotes” rule: titles of works.

For example: Growing up, I loved the movie “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang”. Because the punctuation isn’t a part of the title, it should live outside the quotes, no?

thx!

-Andy in North Park

American style guides will tell you to put the period inside the quotes even there–it’s a very consistent, long-standing tradition, and totally WRONG, as you point out. British style guides do it correctly, putting the quoted stuff inside quotes and the non-quoted stuff outside, with no special rule for commas and periods. While I’m usually happy to follow convention for its own sake, and I honor (with no U) American English as highly as that used elsewhere, this is one case where long-standing tradition just needs to be thrown out the window. As Grant points out, computer programmers (and many technology-related magazines and web sites) already do this, using American styles for everything except the stupid, wrong, and pointless quote rule. It’s time for another American revolution, and this time, we should do it the British way.

I even went so far as to insist upon it in my last published article–I wouldn’t let them publish it unless they put the commas where they belong, dammit, and not blindly follow a style guide that’s obsolete and counter to common sense and reason.

Revolt! Put your commas where they belong!

martha said:

Lee, why don’t you tell us how you really feel?

Seriously, I’m all ears/eyes: What exactly is the problem with the American style? Are you saying this specifically because of the computer-language problem, or are there other reasons?

To me it’s simply a matter of clarity and precision: quotation marks mean something, namely, that the stuff inside is a quotation. The American rule simply violates that for no good reason. I suppose some might consider the visual esthetics of the text to be a valid reason, but I don’t think that should override precise expression.

And yes, I admit that I’m a computer programmer, so maybe I’m biased.