Author Archives: Geraldine

About Geraldine

Forty years of teaching English, a lifetime of walking around New York City, and fifty or so books: my qualifications for making snarky comments on language as I see and hear it in New York.

Anatomy Lessons

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Thousands of words have been written about the media’s tendency to present unrealistic body images. These signs are unrealistic, too, but in their own glorious way:

Where?

Where?

This shop apparently caters to customers whose toenails center around their spines. If that’s your situation, you’d certainly want a pedicure. Just think how uncomfortable it would be to settle into a chair, lean back, and hit a toenail.

Staying on the subject of feet, I can’t resist reposting this sign (see “Massage Tips”  at http://www.grammarianinthecity.com/?p=1253):

Front feet not included.

Front feet not included.

 

The hyphen in “back-foot” creates one description; therefore, this store massages only your back foot. Go somewhere else if your front feet are sore.

Here’s another sign that assumes some strange anatomical features:

How many upper lips do you have?

How many upper lips do you have?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Okay, “upper lips” and “under lips” may be a general reference to body parts, not a strict count of what’s on a client’s face. But why the singular “chin” then?  A customer is more likely to have more than one chin than more than one upper or under lip, even in this city well supplied with supermodels who wear size zero. And what’s a “side face”? Is each side $10, or do some people opt for an asymmetrical look?

I’m not even going to speculate about the meaning of “Men Ear Wax or Thread.” But if you want to do so, go for it!

Numbers Game

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In the spirit of “five out of four people don’t understand fractions,” I present these gems from math-challenged sign-makers:

How much more or less?

How much more and less?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Forgive me for relying on logic here, but isn’t “more and less” a contradiction? Perhaps the writer meant “more or less,” a description that could apply to a penny and to a trillion bucks. At least that interpretation might be true.  “More and less,” on the other hand, could only mean . . . well, what could it mean? Ideas welcome.

And then there’s time. Einstein’s theory of relativity (but not math) is alive and well in NYC:

Long week.

Long week.

 

The above photo is from a store named Muji, where a week lasts thirty days. One can only hope that the employees are paid by the hour.

The next sign proves that government is just as “innumerate” (the number version of “illiterate”) as private enterprise:

Weak on "week."

Weak on the definition of “week.”

 

If anyone tells you that government employees indulge in four-day weeks, especially in the summer, whip out this sign. In New York City, Restaurant Week lasts 26 days.

 

“Punctuation”; Puzzles.

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The title looks strange — on purpose — and it’s no stranger than the random addition or removal of periods, commas, and quotation marks in NYC’s signs. I wrote about the placement of periods in “Stop Full Stop” (http://www.grammarianinthecity.com/?p=1364). In this post I expand on the puzzles of punctuation. First up is this photo, which my friend Erica Berenstein sent me:

Can you spot the period?

Can you spot the period?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Reluctantly leaving aside the issue of capital letters, I can’t figure out the marketing advantage of placing a period after “dream” and nowhere else. True, the list separates the clauses (subject-verb pairs), but then why place any periods at all in this ad?

Microsoft takes a different approach to punctuation, as you see in these messages that popped up on my screen during a recent update:

And the comma is there because . . .?

And the comma is there because . . .?

 

The first part of the statement seems to be a shortened form of “we are getting things ready,” an independent clause. But if that’s the intended construction, the rules of Standard English don’t allow you to attach the first independent clause to the second (“Please don’t turn off your PC”) with a comma. Another possible interpretation is that “getting things ready” is an introductory participle, in which case the participle should modify the subject of the following clause. The problem with this explanation is that the subject of “please don’t turn off your PC” is an implied “you.” But “you” aren’t getting things ready. Microsoft is, or so it claims. By the way, there’s a period missing after “PC.” With such attention to detail, the upgrade promises to be buggy at best.

Here’s another Microsoft gem:

windows2

 

 

Okay, the words make sense, and the sentence begins with a capital letter. It ends with . . . nothing. No period. No exclamation point. Not even a question mark, which, given the state of internet security these days, would be more than appropriate.

Last one. Can anyone find a reason for these quotation marks?

P1020112

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’m stumped. Feel free to send in your theories, properly punctuated, of course!

April Fool

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Slightly out of season, I know, but like most New Yorkers, I’ve spent this August dreaming of a time when the city wasn’t wrapped in a blanket of hot, wet air. Specifically April, when I snapped these photos and mentally placed them in the “April Fool” category, though I’m fairly certain the creators thought their signs were models of clarity. First up is a statement about a mysterious “shirt machine”:

How are your shirt conditions?

How are your shirt conditions?

 

I’d probably be tempted to use this device if my clothing were in good “conditions.” But my tees and blouses currently feature sweaty patches, grass stains, and one blob of what may be somebody’s used chewing gum. I’m not interested in keeping those conditions “better and longer” or, for that matter, keeping them at all.

From the next sign I learned that the city has a “Business Integrity Commission.” Great. If only NYC had a grammar commission as well:

Recycling what?

Recycling what?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Absent punctuation, the establishment is “recycling used cooking oil services.” How exactly do you recycle “services”? And did someone call a hyphen strike without informing me? I’d rewrite the sign this way: “Bio Energy Development, Inc. recycles used cooking-oil from this establishment.”

One more, also punctuation-challenged:

Refinish repair?

Refinish repair?

As written, the shop is offering “restoration” of antique furniture. They also do “caning,” which has nothing to do (I think) with corporal punishment and instead involves weaving strips of stiff grass into a chair seat. So far, so good. Both services are nouns, and both may apply to antique furniture.

Where I crash and burn is “refinish repair,” which seem to be verbs in this context. Is the store refinishing something it had previously repaired, or are they refinishing and repairing upholstery? If so, a couple of -ing syllables would be helpful. Also, is it possible to “refinish” upholstery? Paging furniture specialists! Send in your clarifications, please. While I wait to hear from you, I’ll dream of cooler days.

 

 

 

Busting what?

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Recently The New York Times quoted a politician’s reference to “ordinary people busting their necks.” Instead of thinking about the presidential campaign, socio-economic class, and other important issues, I got stuck on one question: Why “necks”?

When I was a kid, “busting” (or “breaking”) your neck was a description of physical danger, as in “slow down or you’ll bust your neck.” However, the politician was talking about people who work hard, day in and day out. What “ordinary people” were busting, linguistically, were body parts considerably closer to the floor than their necks.

Not to be coy: The phrase the politician should have used was “busting their butts.” But — “butt” isn’t always accepted in polite company. Hence the proliferation of euphemisms, such as “seat,”  “rear,” and “bottom.” And “butt” isn’t the only body-part word to land in the improper column. In the 19th century, ladies ordered “seat fixing,” not “rump steak,” and ate “chests” or a “slice of bosom” instead of chicken breasts.

But we’re in the 21st century, not the 19th. I searched the Internet to see whether the expression had changed. I found some videos with disturbing titles like “busting pimples on your neck,” which I wisely decided not to watch. I also found  references to “break ya neck” in song lyrics. Those were about sex — I think — not jobs.

So the politician’s comment was inaccurate. There’s a shock! At least this time the mistake was in word choice, not facts. I admit I may be missing something because I spend a lot of time “busting my neck” at the computer, composing this blog and writing books. And I also admit that in a campaign season filled with outrageous statements, retaining a bit of shame is somehow comforting.

Odds

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A quick search of The New York Times yields 137, 513 hits for the word “odd.” The earliest appeared in 1851, and the word shows up regularly thereafter – never more frequently than in this, well, odd presidential campaign. But this post isn’t about politics. It’s about the odd expressions I’ve seen lately, such as the one on this sign:

Non-renewal?

Non-renewal?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In my apartment-rental years, I signed many leases, but never a “non-renewal” one. I wonder what this sort of lease stipulates. Your lease extends to never? Your new monthly rent is zero dollars? (See http://www.grammarianinthecity.com/?p=1477 for other nonsensical “zero” signs.)

Here’s another odd expression:

Specialized?

Specialized?

I saw this on the side of a truck. Apparently, the contractor “specialized” in bathroom renovations. Good to know, if you’re seeking a renovation in the past. Lacking a handy time-travel gadget, though, potential customers may see a problem here.

One more:

Apostrophe? Preposition?

Missing apostrophe? Preposition?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This sign screams “scam,” and not because of its odd wording, which I presume is the result of omitting the preposition “for” (I buy all cars for cash) and not an apostrophe (I buy all cars’ cash). But aside from grammar, who can buy “all cars”? And how much cash would it take? What would the buyer do with them? Odd indeed!

 

Lemon Ranch

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Tucked inside the thousands of words written about presidential politics recently was this sentence: “Richard Nixon was raised on a lemon ranch.” New Yorker that I am, my exposure to agricultural terms comes mostly from the  vegetable aisle in the supermarket and a few television shows.  I’d always envisioned a “ranch” as a place where cattle or other animals live. And indeed, the first definition of “ranch” in my dictionary is “a large farm for raising horses, beef cattle, or sheep.” But I had to put aside my mental image of young Dick Nixon roping citrus fruit — and how much fun it was to think about that instead of current events! — when I saw the second definition, which is “a farm or area devoted to a particular specialty.” Further searching showed me that many Californians work on “lemon ranches.” But in Florida, Belize, and Sicily, lemon “orchards,” “groves,” and “farms” predominate. So now I know what term to use in the unlikely event that I go right to the source for my fruit.

Knowing the favored regional expression may not guarantee that you’ll be mistaken for a native, but at least you won’t shout your status as a tourist. And who wants to sound like a tourist? With this in mind, here are a few mistakes I heard recently from visitors to NYC:

  • “Avenue of the Americas.” Big mistake. To New Yorkers, this street is “Sixth Avenue,” and many won’t know what you’re talking about if you use the official name. Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia tried to do away with the term “Sixth Avenue” in 1945, hoping that Central and South American countries would build consulates there. The plan didn’t work, and the new name didn’t either.
Where?

Where?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  • “I caught the subway at 96th Street.” Nope. You can catch a bus (or a railroad train), but you “get on” or “take” a subway. I’m not sure why. Most commuters in New York run madly for the subway as if it were the last rocket leaving an exploding planet, but they don’t “catch” it.
  • “She works in Bronx.” Nope again. It’s “the Bronx.” Why? That area was once a farm belonging to the Broncks, a Dutch family. You won’t find any farms in “the Bronx” (or lemon ranches either), but the name stuck, with slightly different spelling.

I could say more about talking like a New Yorker. (For starters, it’s “tawking like a New Yawker.”) But I’ll stop now so I can catch the subway from the Avenue of the Americas to Bronx.

Thanks for nothing

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Recently I took advantage of New York City’s IDNYC program, which gave me an official photo ID and a raft of free membership offers to some of the city’s best museums. In redeeming one of those membership offers at an institution I won’t embarrass by naming, I received an email thanking me for my “contribution of $0.00” and telling me that donations such as mine “support the work of the museum.” If that’s true, the museum is probably nearing bankruptcy. Continue reading →

Magritte in NYC

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On this Bastille Day, I am pleased to report that Rene Magritte is alive and well and creating art in New York City:

"Ceci n'est pas une 'bike stand.'"

“Ceci n’est pas une ‘bike stand.'”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For the sake of comparison, here is one of Magritte’s earlier works:

To see the original, go to Los Angeles.

To see the original, go to Los Angeles.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In case you’re wondering about the power of art, I staked out this spot for a while, to see whether a bicycle would be chained to it.  New Yorkers do sometimes interpret a prohibition as a dare. But no bikes appeared. Either the sign is very effective or the glowering shop owner, who was standing next to this tree every time I passed, scares cyclists into compliance. Either way, enjoy Bastille Day. (Especially you, Don and Avram, my art historian friends.)

Best wishes

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In these days of anguish, I’ve noticed many New Yorkers trying harder to take care of each other. On the Third Avenue bus last Saturday night, the driver told departing passengers to “have a very, very, very good evening” or to “be happy, be happy, be extremely happy.” She repeated variations of these statement at each stop with intensity and, as far as I could tell, sincerity. When I got off the bus, she told me to “enjoy, really enjoy” myself. I was grateful for her concern.

Earlier that day, in a pub near the former World Trade Center, the waitress asked my husband and me how “you guys’s day” had been. She really seemed to want to know  and to hope that the answer was “good” or something even more positive.  I spent most of the afternoon trying to decide how to spell what I had heard, which sounded like “you guizes.” The traditional rule for possessive plurals ending in the letter S, such as “guys,” is to tack on an apostrophe after the S. But “you guys” isn’t a traditional plural. Instead, it’s one of the ways New Yorkers indicate that “you” refers to more than one person. (The other common local expression for the plural “you” is “youse” — effective, but not Standard English.) The pronoun you, of course, may be either singular or plural. Lucky waitress: She didn’t have to write down her thoughts or worry about grammar.

That task falls to me. My first idea was “you guys’ day.” That seemed wrong, though, because the pronunciation would be “you guize” — more direct address or a simple plural than possession. I considered writing the phrase as pronounced (“you guizes” or “you guyses”), but then where would I place the apostrophe? And without the punctuation mark, the possessive sense is lost.

I haven’t settled the question, though as you see, I opted for the grammatically incorrect but phonetically accurate “you guys’s.” Your thoughts are welcome — as was the sense of inclusion the waitress was going for. She didn’t want to exclude anyone, a sentiment that, universally applied, would create a better society. And, you guys, we really need that now.