Please except mistakes and apology

I made a grammatic error last week.

Yes, in the second sentence of last weeks column I committed the gaff of saying that a certain day was a holiday “for my fellow men and I.” As every six grader knows, it should of been “for my fellow men and me,” following the simple rule that you would never say it was a holiday “for I.” Nor would you say it was a holiday “for fellow.”

A couple of our loyal Defenders of the Grammar immediately wrote to informed me of my grammar error. While the gesture was appreciated, it wasn’t entirely necessitated.

That’s because I had noticed it exactly the same moment they had, about exactly one second after picking up the IN Life section that morning. My wife and friends would testify that I uttered a string of oaths regarding my own stupidness, something along the lines of, “I can’t believe how complete and total blanking of a moron I am.”

I mention this in order to make the following four points:

1. I did, in fact, catch the mistake, excepting it was “too late.”

2. I did in fact, know the rule, even though one reader lectured at me as if she were Miss Wilborn and I am back in freshman English.

3. I do, in fact, care. Being a professional writer and all.

What I think is this: You Defenders of the Grammar don’t realize something. I am on you’re side.

When I say “Defenders of the Grammar,” you know who you are. You are the people that tirelessly scan the paper for mismatched tenses, split infinitives, dangling perjoratives and the use of “that” when it should be “who.” I respect you for your commitment and believe wholeheartedly that you are performing a valuable watchdog function. Don’t ever give the fight up.

Yet some times I think that you think that we are a bunch of ignorant Philodendrons who want to take the noble English language and butcher them. You don’t understand: I’m not trying to make mistakes. Its not like were trying to be stupid, deliberately. Its just that their are lots of words in every story and its hard to get every single one of them right.

Take that mistake I made last week. I wrote something like 700 words of whom only one was actually wrong. True, some of the others were questionable. I had a couple sentences that were incomplete and maybe a couple that runned on. But really, maybe five wrong words out of 700? That’s incredibly perfect from the perspective of percentage.

And then when you look at the whole paper? Maybe, what, 100,000 words everyday? And we get just one little headline wrong? Something like saying “pubic utilities district”? As potatoes go, you got to admit that’s small.

Anyways, what I was saying was that I care just as much as you, I really do. I read that book “Eats, Shoots and Leaves,” which is all about grammar mistakes and how annoying they are, and I sat there and said, “Ain’t that the truth.”

I can’t stand it when people misuse apostrophes like they do all the time on signs: “Cigarette’s, $12 a carton.” Give me a brake.

The comma is another pet peeve of mine. People don’t know the correct use of the comma anymore, and they keep tossing them into spots which they don’t belong or not using them at all when they are required for clarity or to prevent embarrassing gaffes such as, “Michael Jackson loved an ice cream cone as a little boy.”

Another thing which drives me mad: Quote marks used incorrectly. People are always putting quote marks around words that don’t need it, like in an e-mail where they’ll say: “Hey, gals, lets get together for ‘coffee’ and ‘chat.’ “

What do they need to put those quote marks for? Are “coffee” and “chat” euphemisms for something unprintable, like “drinking scotch” and “complaining about our husbands”?

They are? Well never mind then.

Anyhow, I just wanted to let everyone know that I know the grammatical rules, at least a lot of them, and I would never violate them all on purpose.

However, under the unexorable crush of deadlines, incorrectancies occasionally slip through. If I made any more mistakes this week, please circle them and send it to me. I have a certain pride of craftsmanship where it comes to righting and I try to get them write, I really am. Its just that there are so many thinks to thing about.

So please bare in mind one thing if you see anymore mistakes: Nobodys perfect, and in this I am speaking for all of my fellow writers and I.