Don’t Forget to “Buy” Our “Product!”
So I was walking down the streets of New York the other day and passed by a sign outside of a restaurant that said:
We now have “sushi.”
What does that mean? Since quotes are generally used to connote irony or something unusual about the word (when not actually quoting something or someone), I have got to assume that whatever they’re selling is, in fact, NOT sushi, but some parody thereof.
I know I’m a little nitpicky when it comes to little stuff like spelling and grammar, and usually I just snicker at emails from friends (or strangers) and get on with my life. But when someone is trying to sell me something, the least I expect them to do is use proper English. When they don’t, I lose respect for them as a credible vendor, and they lose my business.
For instance, I’ve been receiving all sorts of advertisements in the mail for various bridal-related services: photography, limousines, flowers, etc. One such envelope, upon opening, contained a letter, which read:
Hello Future Bride,
We are a new store which opened recently in May of 2005.
Besides a complete variety of accessories and gift box rentals (bridal doll is our newest), we hand craft your bridal veil “custom” to your exact detail or you can “Rent” A Bridal Veil that we have in stock!
This being the first thing I read, I was terribly confused. May 2005 isn’t that recent. Okay, it’s not quite a year old, so maybe “recently” is still an acceptable word. But either way, why not just say “opened recently” or “opened in May of 2005,” thus eliminating confusion?
The second sentence really doesn’t make very much sense either. Someone clearly didn’t have to diagram sentences in 6th grade, because this one is a mess. According to that sentence, I have to assume they handcraft accessories and gift box rentals, which has got to be difficult. And what the hell is “bridal doll?” Is it a gift box rental? Do they make gift boxes with little dolls dressed up as brides inside? Does the box look like a doll? Do they rent the doll?
The point of the next part of the sentence, I’m sure, is that they will customize a bridal veil for me. But apparently they only need one detail in order to do so. Do I get to pick the detail? That’s why “custom” is in quotation marks, right? Because if I only give them one detail, then it’s not really that customized, right? Right?
If they want me to “rent” a bridal veil, does that mean it’s not really a rental? Do I get to keep it longer than most rentals? Is it like a car lease or something, where there’s a buy-in agreement at the end? Maybe the reason “A Bridal Veil” is capitalized is that it’s patented and I’m renting their product but also advertising for them.
The letter goes on (I won’t quote the whole thing), but it ends with this gem:
And when your wedding is over, I offer “hand” cleaning and preservation of your bridal gown and formal gown cleaning using no machinery or excessive heat, which causes damage.
So somewhere in the middle of the letter, the pronouns switch from “we” to “I.” That’s only slightly bothersome, though: the really scary idea is the “‘hand’ cleaning.” Once again, is that an ironic remark? Maybe they don’t use their hands; maybe they use their feet. That would certainly be different, something to set themselves apart from the pack.
The way the punctuation stands at the moment, they offer preservation of not only your bridal gown but also your formal gown cleaning. How they preserve cleaning, I’m not sure, but however they do it, they use no machinery or excessive heat. I suppose that’s a plus. They never tell me what it causes damage to, but I suppose we all can guess that they’re talking about the gown, not the person doing the cleaning.
Now that my rant is over, I will leave you with this picture I took after I saw the “sushi” sign (I should have taken a picture of the “sushi” sign, but it didn’t occur to me until later). It’s not the same problem, but it is yet another example of a well-meaning, English-challenged company trying to do some advertising.
Why did it take me so long to catch this?
After watching Ray watch The Incredibles for the umpteenth time, I realized that there is a MAJOR grammar blooper in a movie that will probably be influencing the way kids speak. When Mr. Incredible gets his first assignment from Mirage, she says, “We have something in common. According to the government, neither of us exist.” I think it bugged me when I first saw it and maybe the second time, but I must have tuned it out the next 15 or 16 times it’s been on the TV.
Yo, Disney/Pixar people!!! Your verb must agree with its subject. “Neither” is singular, and therefore the correct wording is “neither of us exists.” Why did no one over there catch that? Is it in the script and Elizabeth Peña just didn’t speak English too well and nobody bothered to correct her? I’m also a little shocked that there aren’t any forums or blogs or any kind of commentary out in the great wide world of cyberspace about it either. Well, if no one else will speak up about it, I suppose I must.
Okay, I think I’ve seen this movie one too many times. I’m going to go do my taxes now…that should calm me down.
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