Annoying word usage – are you guilty of these?

Are you guilty of these common errors?

Incorrect use of Me, Myself and I

Please learn to use these correctly. Nothing grates on my ears like:

“If you have any questions, ask Betsy or myself.” Nobody can ask, give or do anything to yourself but you. If Betsy weren’t there would you say “If you have any questions, ask myself.”? Get out of this habit. Likewise:

“Me and Jim were the only ones who showed up at the gallery opening. ” What would you say if Jim weren’t there?

Lie and lay. Please, I beg you! Stop telling your dog to lay down.

These are simple common grammar errors and don’t seem like a big deal but if they are not such a big deal then learn to use them correctly.

Some words get used incorrectly so often that the meaning actually changes into how people have constantly misused them. Interesting factoid, no?

Two more such words are “gift” and “entitle”. I think people use these because they think they sound fancier. I like to keep nouns and verbs separate. I give a gift. I don’t gift something. I can’t stand hearing it.

“Entitle” used to mean to give a right to, (He was entitled to his severance pay.) except in Ye Olde English when it meant to give a title to someone. More and more I read about pieces of work which are “entitled”, rather than simply being “titled.”

I prefer to keep things simple. It keeps everything clean sounding and there’s less room for confusion.

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