Where did it come from? A quick web search turned up a suggestion that it was coined by a basketball player about 20 years ago.

Recently this meme has become much more common via some unknown but virulent vector. I have heard a couple of people at work say it and now my son has started saying it a lot.

I react almost with convulsions when I hear it! It is so mistake!

Are they questioning their own commitment to breast cancer research?

I can’t fathom why the magazine editor allowed this egregiously sloppy copy into the magazine. It makes the advertiser look stupid and doesn’t reflect well on the magazine either.

The radio news announcer told us that by the end of next year, Brisbane residents would be drinking recycled sewerage! (Of course she meant recycled sewage.)

Perhaps the extra r’s could be put back into secretary or February.

OK, so it’s really about punctuation, but it is fun.

We recently received a brochure from a wine merchant that loudly proclaims on its cover:

Must have
wines
for your
collection

Obviously they mean must-have wines, otherwise it is no more than a truism (you must have wines or you don’t have a collection).

So what? We know what they mean. Yes, but without hyphens we often need to read twice to be sure. Properly used, hyphens make reading easier. Otherwise there is ambiguity in meaning and reading is slower.

What are the rules we are apparently not learning in school? Melanie Spiller’s Hyphen Hysteria is a good guide. Wikipedia also provides more detail.

“I went, ‘You are crazy!’ and he went, ‘I am not!’”

During the past few years it is amazingly common to hear forms of the combination be like. I recently heard a young woman at work say:

“So I’m like, ‘You’ve been smoking.’ And he was like, ‘I was not!’”

Where do these usages come from?

Sportspeople often say it; something like, “Yeah no I wasn’t on top of my game today.”

Methinks like the initial yes or yeah is uttered before the speaker has started thinking about what to say. Sportspeople are good at starting their answers to any questions with “Yeah definitely …” whatever the question. Recently I was surprised and relieved to hear the Australian fast bowler Brett Lee not begin his answer to a reporter’s question with the automatic words but instead respond articulately and intelligently.

Here is a capture of part of that page:

I can’t wait to start bidding with wild abandon on an apostasy of apostrophes!

Update: well bugger me! Apostrophe is a brand of womens clothing. I was hoping I could bid for some curvaceous glyphs.

This sign is an excellent example of direct and clear language. It does not use formal ‘legalese’ but there is no ambiguity about what it means.

It appears at a number of railway stations in Brisbane, where I live.