Stop! Grammartime.

Ever heard of Glamour Bombing? I hadn't either until recently. From what I understand, it's a sort of guerrilla performance art. A sneak attack of cute, if you will. While I can appreciate the sentiment behind it (God knows I dig the absurd), I think there's a far greater need for something else:

Grammar Bombing.

I've been anticipating this movement for years. When I find glaring errors in the local newspaper, I've been known to red-pencil them and mail the page back to said paper anonymously. If the mistakes are particularly bad, or if I'm in a foul mood, I'll add a "shame on you" to the top of my missive for good measure. The most heinous instance was the repeated use of the word "trusties" in the place of "trustees". In a headline. On the front page. I had no choice but to Grammar Bomb.

The most common instances of language abuse seem to involve misplaced apostrophes and quote marks. Daily special's. "Fresh" flowers. I know I've waxed poetic about this before, but, dammit, it's just getting worse. Occasionally, I'll run into a sign or a menu with striking errors, and I sometimes try to point them out, often using humor. I ran into a whiteboard martini menu last week that read, simply: Martini's. Martini's what? Martini's socks? Martini's philosophy? Martini's shattered dreams? The suspense nearly killed me. If there had been an available whiteboard marker I might have posted these musings. I might have had to Grammar Bomb.

Does this mean I'm nuts? Probably. Do I care? Not a whit. When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one gal to dissolve the steadfast hold of the misused apostrophe ... well, she has to go for it. She's got a moral imperative to Grammar Bomb. Right? Right.

I suppose that I'm most bothered by the fact that many of these newspaper articles and signs must pass through the hands of several people during production. Here's an example: the sign on a local hair salon reads "Cuts For Men and Boy's". Now, somebody had to figure out the wording on that sign. Perhaps they sketched out the basics. Then they approached a business to manufacture the sign. I'd imagine that the design and layout were approved by the original author. Then the sign had to be made. It had to be installed. And nobody, nobody, noticed the bad punctuation? Nobody even tried to tactfully suggest, even from an aesthetic perspective, that the apostrophe might not be a good move (never mind the random capitals)? That's what astounds me.

I won't even go into the wholesale slaughter of there/their/they're.

Now, I'm not a hypocrite. Well, okay, maybe a little bit. I know there are likely countless errors on this very blog. This entry alone probably contains fifteen grammatical missteps. However, I'm not a writer. I'm not an editor. It's not my job to produce perfect prose. I do my best, but - hey - I know my limitations, and I welcome correction. Besides, I suspect my readership probably lingers in the lofty single digits, so at the very least my carnage is contained. But a newspaper? Don't they hire people to edit and fact-check? Wouldn't a signmaker double-check these things?

I may be guilty of all sorts of moral shortcomings. Thankfully, misplaced possessives don't generally appear on that roster.

So their. How about them apple's?