{"id":319,"date":"2008-03-02T09:16:03","date_gmt":"2008-03-02T16:16:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=319"},"modified":"2008-03-03T21:20:47","modified_gmt":"2008-03-04T04:20:47","slug":"not-on-my-watch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=319","title":{"rendered":"Not on My Watch"},"content":{"rendered":"

This morning I added several new reference links<\/a> to my browser’s favorites list.\u00a0 When I’m writing (yes, even writing for\u00a0friends via this humble blog), I\u00a0look things up, including things I’m pretty sure I know.\u00a0 Like the title to this entry.\u00a0 Is “on” supposed to be capitalized?\u00a0 No<\/a>.\u00a0 I thought not;\u00a0now I’m sure.<\/p>\n

I drew the line at adding a link to the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, though.\u00a0 One, I already have a link to Merriam-Webster, and I’m used to M-W’s interface.\u00a0 Two, the American Heritage Dictionary caves to the stupids on gauntlet\/gantlet<\/a>.\u00a0 Thank God my hard-copy 1984 edition of the AP Style Guide’s still in good shape, because I don’t know where I’d get another.<\/p>\n

I’m the guy, by the way, who almost canceled his subscription to The New Yorker when its editors abandoned “vendor” for “vender.”<\/p>\n

As an English major I’ve always felt like a second-class citizen.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Because when people break the rules of English usage\u00a0. . .\u00a0nothing happens<\/em>.\u00a0 So you don’t know the difference between “to” and “too”?\u00a0 You use “there” for “their”?\u00a0 You\u00a0insert apostrophes before every terminal “s”?\u00a0 So what?\u00a0 It’s not like the roof’s going to fall in!<\/p>\n

Nobody screws around with the rules of mathematics.\u00a0 You build a house with substandard math skills, boyo, and the roof?\u00a0 It falls in.\u00a0 It just isn’t fair.<\/p>\n

Well, this little corner of the web is going to uphold the standards of English usage.\u00a0 As long as I can look up the rules I’ll do my best to comply with them.\u00a0 And thank you for indulging me in a curmudgeon moment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This morning I added several new reference links to my browser’s favorites list.\u00a0 When I’m writing (yes, even writing for\u00a0friends via this humble blog), I\u00a0look things up, including things I’m pretty sure I know.\u00a0 Like the title to this entry.\u00a0 Is “on” supposed to be capitalized?\u00a0 No.\u00a0 I thought not;\u00a0now I’m sure. I drew the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,2,21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture","category-personal","category-words"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=319"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}