fun pairs

[Melissa Hunter-Kilmer <mhunterk -at- BNA -dot- COM>]

TRIAD Services <TRIADserv -at- AOL -dot- COM> (who presumably has a name, but
hasn't used it that I've seen) wrote:

> Okay, so aside from
> its  / it's
> affect / effect
> your / you're
> all right / alright
> a lot ------> allot -----> alot
> who's / whose

> let's start listing some of our favorite illiteracies that pop up in
> daily usage and see WHOSE wins the prize. <G>

every day / everyday
under way / underway
and similar pairs

"Alright" and "alot" are not words.  They apparently came into being
as parallels to "already."

Like Ernie Tamminga, I bewail the demise of the distinction between
"criterion" and "criteria."  I also bewail the similar fate of
"phenomenon" and "phenomena."  It's the Greek major in me, no doubt.

Oh, and how about "hiearchy"?  Argh!  Put an extra R in there, kids,
it won't hurt a bit!

One that really irks me is "ad nauseum."  I know, it looks like it
should be spelled like "museum," but it comes from "nausea," so it's
really "nauseam."  (I didn't finger anybody in particular, okay?  I
have sat on my hands while a bazillion posters nause-u-ted me.  But
sometimes it all just becomes Too Much, she wailed, sobbing into a
user's guide.)

Melissa Hunter-Kilmer
mhunterk -at- bna -dot- com
(standard disclaimer)

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