Mean Ol' Schoolmarm
The Mean Ol' Schoolmarm has her switch in hand and is ready to point out common grammatical errors she hears every day. Beware her wrath.
My wife follows a website called The Pioneer Woman mostly for the photo-illustrated recipes. The author Ree homeschools her 4 kids and has a section of the website dedicated to homeschooling. One of the features in this section is the Mean Ol' Schoolmarm where she gets after people for common grammatical errors, usually words that are confused like "your" and "you're". It's wonderful - except that the model in the photo doesn't look very "Ol'" nor near stern enough. Anyway if you have a pet grammatical peeve, the Mean Ol' Schoolmarm may have already addressed it.
One of my favorite peeves that is addressed by the Mean Ol' Schoolmarm is complimentary vs complementary [18 January 2011]. I own a health food store and a common name for natural medicine like vitamins and herbs is "Complementary Medicine". This term is used in reaction to an older term "Alternative Medicine", to suggest that both natural and conventional medicine can work together. Whenever I see all too frequent references to "Complimentary Medicine", I imagine a doctor making his/her hospital rounds saying things like "My you are looking good this morning, Mr. Jones" or "That green hospital gown really suits your auburn hair, Miss Smith." I suppose such compliments might make the patients feel a little better and to some extent actually improve their health. Perhaps Complimentary Medicine 101 should be a required course in all medical schools.
Bedside manner (complimentary medicine) is taught to Doctors and Veterinarians in the class "Believing and Acting Like You are God".
ReplyDeleteThere is a Family Circus cartoon where Jeffrey is being hauled away from the school door by his father. At the door stands a very cute young teacher. The father says to Jeffrey "Now that I have met your mean ugly old school teacher, I am taking you to the optometrist".
One use of the word "complimentary" that is often found confusing is the meaning that something is free of charge. The gift is given, usually by a business to a customer, "With my compliments".
ReplyDeleteThe "e" spelling of complementary should be easy to remember because it means to complete something.
True. I hate when someone tries to give me a "complement." LOL I say, "I'm fine on my own," which gets me funny looks. Same with "complimentary colours." Blue just loves to flatter that Orange... what a cad. XD
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