Choose Your Words Carefully

There was a conversation going on next to me on the train recently. Just general chit chat between two friends talking about their shopping habits. The gist was that they needed to cut back the trips to High Street.

“I just need to buy less clothes in general to be honest,” one said.

I masked an involuntary shudder.

When I overhear strangers misusing less and fewer I don’t correct them. I just wince inside and take a few calming deep breaths.

I’m a bit of a closet grammar nazi but take care to only inflict my pedantry on the people I love and care about.

“Less clothes?!” “ Less?!!” “Clothes?!!!!”

Give me strength. If that was a family member I’d have given them what for!

Obviously I’m not really a monster but if they get upset I hold them close and gently whisper “There, their, they’re.”

D'Ya Know What I Mean?

This isn’t true. I don’t really get fussed about less and fewer.

I notice it but who cares? The meaning is understood and that’s what is most important. 

Word meanings change and I reckon ‘less’ will become accepted over time as a proper replacement for ‘fewer.’ They’ll become interchangeable. More or less.

Other words change too. 'Decimate' already has. 

“The food poisoning at the office party affected the whole company. The workforce was completely decimated!”

The meaning conveyed is that the whole workforce was off with sickness and we all understand this. Yet, technically they are telling us that ten percent of the workforce was off with food poisoning. 

It’s often journalists who use 'decimate' this way and surely must know the correct meaning. Maybe the true meaning has already evolved.

Words mean what I want them to mean said Humpty Dumpty. And who are we to argue to with Humpty?

Still, I would argue that, whatever you are trying to communicate, it’s important to be in control of that communication. 

A Horse With No Name

Consider the following two sentences:

I helped my Uncle Jack off a horse

or 

I helped my uncle jack off a horse

Just a simple use of capitals changes the whole meaning. 

The first sentence is about a nephew assisting his mother’s brother after some equine activity. 

While the second is . . . erm, well, actually could be the same thing really, couldn’t it?

But let’s move swiftly on.

It’s enough to say that you must take time and care when you communicate. You have to check that the message you intend to communicate is the actual message you do indeed communicate.

Three Steps

Let's look at email. I notice that a lot of people are too hasty pressing send. They only use a two step process:

1 - They write what they want to say 

2 - They send it

It’s only after a message has been sent do they notice that, because of one or two small errors, the message they wanted to convey has not been sent. 

Most of the time it doesn’t matter. But now and again it does. And more often than you think.

The kind suggestion to an elderly relative of “Let’s eat, grandma!” is going to have a much nicer ending than the macabre, cannibalistic order “Let’s eat grandma!”. 

Avoid family meal time disasters by adding one small step to the two step process. Make it a three step process. 

1 - Write what you want to say

2 - Read it back to ensure it says what you want it to say

3 - Now you can send it

While you’re doing step two really take the time to read it.

Go slowly.

Read what’s actually there rather than what you think you’ve put down.

(Look Up The Number)

When I give out my credit card number over the phone I get the person on the other end to read it back to me BUT in reverse. That way you effectively hear a different number in order to get the right card details. You avoid just hearing what you think the numbers say.

With words you need to take the time to recognise what the grammar or punctuation does or doesn’t do to your message. Or if there is a change required. 

Just one single misunderstood apostrophe could cause huge relationship issues.

“Darling, in this moonlight your teeth look just like pearls.”

“Who the hell is Pearl and why were you looking at her teeth in the moonlight?”

This weekend take a moment or two to enjoy hearing how you communicate to the people in your life. What patterns do you notice?