Grammar rules

There are numerous sites around the Internet where the rules of grammar are chiselled in stone and where frighteningly knowledgeable people are ready to scold you for your little mis-uses.

I've been one of them although I always tried to cajole rather than scold. The Writing Resource, a team of writers, editors and educators used a blog I wrote about grammar and proper use of words. Many of my pet peeves are included in the blog and I hope you'll go and have a look because for sure, you'll see that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

I'm not going to rehash my favourites (tow the line? bare the pain?) but they're there, along with scores of others.

You might think we've come to the end of the line. All the mistakes have already been made and from now on, it's just a matter of re-hashing the old ones until everyone has been corrected and chastened and, in the end, enlightened.

Think again. I have a new one.

A few days ago, I was reading the comment thread in one place or another and found myself oddly absorbed in a heated discussion between two people – strangers to me and, I think, strangers to each other. One of them became very annoyed which caused the other to say (and I'm paraphrasing both of them): "You seem to have taken unbridge at something I've said but I stand by my opinion." The other guy said, "Yeah, well your opinion is wrong and furthermore, I didn't take 'unbridge' as you said. I took 'umbridge'."

Well, I take umbrage at both of you. I considered dropping in on the conversation to say just that but I thought it would be obnoxious.

Good grammar and using words correctly are all very well but we must remain gracious.