h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Spelling, on the other hand... Bad spelling drives me insane....

Like how that should say "split *infinitives", for example....

*ahem*

*shamelessly diverts attention*

So, useless facts... Christopher Judge appears in more episodes of Stargate SG-1 than anyone else. That's... not interesting at all...

I find that hard to believe. Surely Jack O'Neill was in all of them?

Jack O'Neill (aka Richard Dean Anderson) left the show at the end of Season 8. Daniel Jackson (Michael Shanks) only appeared as a guest star in a few episodes of Season 6, having quit the show because he didn't like the way his character was developing (or something).

I'll take your word for it that Christopher Judge has appeared in more episodes than Amanda Tapping, but I'm struggling to think of episodes she didn't appear in.

OK, I did some checking. Amanda Tapping missed four episodes of Season 9 because of maternity leave.

'Much fewer' is sorta like 'many less'.
For what it's worth I woulda said 'not as many'
but someone else might say 'no so many' and they'd
likely have a few more authorities on their side.

~jwf~

< Spelling, on the other hand... Bad spelling drives me insane.... >

Yes. I'm the same, but as with grammar, we have only arrived at the 'correct' spelling by a process of hit and miss sort of convention. I'm sure there must be words that have more than one acceptible spelling. I just can't think of any right now.

PP.

As I posted that I remembered one.

Disc and disk.

Whichever I write, I always think I have got it wrong and that the other spelling is right. So I change it and presto, iit looks wrong. So I change it back.

PP.

"I'm sure there must be words that have more than one acceptible spelling. I just can't think of any right now."

There are far fewer of these kinds of words than you might think.

It's only "disc" if it's refering to optical media. Think of the 'c' in CD.


Much fewer doesn't bother me. What does is when I hear that something is "ten times less/fewer" than something else. Maybe it's just me, but using a multiplier to indicate a smaller value is just so wrong.

[EDIT]

At this point I was going to make a point about "ask" vs. "ax" and even found an NPR story about it. But at the end of the article, they included a link to this from Stephen Fry and it makes a much better point.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7E-aoXLZGY




For those still curious, here's the NPR link. http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2013/12/03/248515217/why-chaucer-said-ax-instead-of-ask-and-why-some-still-do

Anyways, back on topic...


The Playboy Bunny outfit was the first service uniform registered with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (U.S. trademark registration number 0762884).

< It's only "disc" if it's referring to optical media. Think of the 'c' in CD. >

I hurt my back. I slipped a disc dancing to a recording on a 7" vinyl disc.

PP.

I quote from dictionary dot com:
"Did you mean: acceptable?"


~jwf~

I used ta be a disc jockey.



~jwf~

I have no idea what I mean any more. And just WHO decides the accepteble spelling of mulligatawny? (Another word that has bothered me this evening).

PP.

>> no idea what I mean <<

Actually I was correcting BG's spelling of acceptable.
But I was trying to keep it light and fuzzy because
there are so many ibles and ables and ibilities and
abilities to keep strait. Worse than the icles and icals
and the principal principality principle.
Can't really fault anyone for these kinds of slips.

~jwf~

While driving home tonight I heard a commercial where the woman said she had gotten an estimate from one company and then hired the sponsor to do the job for 'a fraction of the price' implying it was much cheaper. It occurred to me that 999/1000 is also a fraction, but not a real big savings.

This is undoubtedly a useless fact

F S

The power point style letter antics on the Stephen Fry video are most annoying. I have left it running in another tab while I write, so I don't have to look at it.

~jwf~, I haven't even used the word 'acceptable' so I doubt I misspelled it.

Sorry BG.
It was Mr PP who started it way back in Post 9447...
>> .. there must be words that have more than one acceptible
spelling. I just can't think of any right now. <<



Which as I say is not a major crime but it only got worser
in Post 9449 when Lusus copied and pasted it.

Then PP deliberately made it worster in 9455.
>> WHO decides the accepteble spelling of mulligatawny? <<
which I don't believe was a rhetorical question and am sad
to see no one has offered assistance. I believe the correct
spelling is minestrone. Which often translates to Mulligan.
Or soup de jour as the French so foppishly put it.


Carry on.

~jwf~