Lettuce

It's no fair mocking typos and misspellings on blogs--the unpaid wretches who write them must do their own proofing as well. But when someone calls attention to an error, and is in error himself...

I mentioned James Lileks yesterday, and I'm giving him more free publicity now, which is like a public access show telling you to watch Desperate Housewives.

In today's dashed-off episode, Lileks reproduces a delightful ad for skinless wieners (and frankfurters) circa WWII. One kid is asking another "How come your mom lets you eat two wieners?"

Lileks' (or Lileks's, if your prefer--both are acceptable no matter what you've heard) comment is strange:

I can understand why they wrote "lets" - all available extra apostrophes were diverted to wartime use, after all.

No James, they didn't use an apostrophe because "lets" was correct. I'll help you out--I let, you let, she (i.e., your mom) lets.

At least he didn't suggest it should be "you're mom let's."

Pajama Guy responds: If correct spelling, by-the-book grammer and competent copy-editing become required for blogging, I'm toast.

LAGuy bounces back: I assume Pajama Guy's obvious error above is intentional.

Anonymous said... My guess is PajamaGuy erred sincerely. What say, PjG? Willing to fess up?

Pajama Guy responds: You're both right. I sincerely tried to get it right, but intentionally didn't check what I wrote.