NCAA batting out of order?

[greymule]

I generally spell "ingenius" this way: "ingenious." Darn, those pesky typos.

Thanks for the opportunity to save face, Carl, but I must confess that it was not a typo. I knew it, but I still blew it. And for me, that is harder to say than, "Coach, I blew the call."

I am now writing ingenious 500 times.

But I can't find anything wrong with the material you quoted,

"a voice will run
From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead;
That is the Grasshopper's—he takes the lead."

What's wrong is that the pronoun he refers to Grasshopper, but all we have preceding the pronoun is the possessive Grasshopper's [voice]. I do think it's a bit of an overstatement to say, "Nobody pays attention to that [rule] anymore." It's easy to make up examples in which breaking that rule would be an obvious mistake.

And yes, only people, or objects that can be anthropomorphized (e.g., the sun), should take an apostrophe for their possessive form.

I appreciate the mention of APA. In my work, I often have to take an article or research paper and change it from one style (AMA, Chicago, MLA, APA, etc.) to another. "Translating" from American to British English (and spelling) and vice versa is also a common task.

By the way, explain this sentence: Whistler painted his mother sitting down.
How about the editor to the writer: I shall waste no time in reading your manuscript.

I'd call the first an example of a squinting modifier and the second simply ambiguous syntax.

Thanks for the interesting and informative post.

[Carl Childress]

[QUOTE=greymule]But I can't find anything wrong with the material you quoted,

"a voice will run
From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead;
That is the Grasshopper's—he takes the lead."

What's wrong is that the pronoun he refers to Grasshopper, but all we have preceding the pronoun is the possessive Grasshopper's [voice]. I do think it's a bit of an overstatement to say, "Nobody pays attention to that [rule] anymore." It's easy to make up examples in which breaking that rule would be an obvious mistake.

Sad to say for my ego, you are right. Hope springs eternal: Perhaps "grasshopper" had been mentioned earlier in the sonnet, thought I. Unfortunately for me, there is NO antecedent for "he," even though everybody knows he is the grasshopper.

The Whistler participial phrase is not exactly squinting. Generally, squinting modifiers are in the middle of the sentence. Here's one I picked up from the internet: "Students who pay attention in class most of the time get higher grades."

I'd call the Whistler sentence "ambivaletly blind."

Moses Hadas is alleged to have written the second sentence. But pre-google, a professor of mine in grad school got away with attributing it to Samuel Johnson.

Oh, the NCAA question that started this is simply silly. A better question (to see if the student knew it was a pitch to the batter of either team that cancelled the appeal) would have been something like this:

Bases loaded, two outs, B2 should bat but B3 bats instead and doubles. Three runs score, but B3 is thrown out, trying for third. The teams change sides, and the pitcher completes his warm-up tosses. After the throw-down and obligatory throws around the infield, the batter steps in and the umpire makes the ball alive. "Wait!" says the coach who had been on defense in the previous half inning. "B3 batted out of order." True or False: It's too late for him to appeal.

"Flase," as some of my students used to write.

[DG]

I'm an engineer, and none of this grammar stuff makes any sense to me. When I write technical stuff I write it technically correct then send to someone to fix the grammar.

[JJ]

The answer posted for the original question in this thread is wrong, so if you had it marked wrong, you got it right. Right?

What does all of the discussion on grammar have to do with anything in this rather straightforeward baseball question thread? I hate to wade through all of that nonsense to find relevant comments. And leave my colon out of this!


JJ

[greymule]

I'm an engineer, and none of this grammar stuff makes any sense to me. When I write technical stuff I write it technically correct then send to someone to fix the grammar.

So do many other engineers, as well as physicians, economists, statisticians, researchers, scientists, and others smart enough to know their limitations. That creates a useful niche for people like me!

[DG]

I don't remember the exact quote but Dirty Harry said "a man's got to know his limitations" or something like that. I know mine and grammar ain't it. Yes, I know ain't ain't a good word and it don't belong at the end of a sentence but I already admitted that grammar ain't my forte.

V = RI is useful to know.