Do you have spelling OCD?

On a related note - does anyone still use a real paper dictionary? I keep one in my office, and just last week used it to look up an unfamiliar word in The Economist (griot).
 
Gumby said:
On a related note - does anyone still use a real paper dictionary? I keep one in my office, and just last week used it to look up an unfamiliar word in The Economist (griot).
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As a kid I would look up a word in the dictionary, then end up reading the entire page or two. Good way to learn words, and you don't get that from googling a spelling/definition. I used to do the same thing with encyclopedia entries. I would end up reading multiple pages after I looked up whatever I was after. I sort of miss that from the paper versions.

Having said that, I got rid of my paper dictionary and thesaurus when I cleaned out my cube 10 years ago. I might have one somewhere in a box, but I couldn't find it if I wanted it right now.
 
Rosie said:
I got all 15, but in a couple of instances, I chose the correct spelling because the other two looked more wrong. :blush:
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This was me, also.
 
Can't spell worth a krap and really don't care that much.
 
harley said:
As a kid I would look up a word in the dictionary, then end up reading the entire page or two. Good way to learn words, and you don't get that from googling a spelling/definition. I used to do the same thing with encyclopedia entries. I would end up reading multiple pages after I looked up whatever I was after. I sort of miss that from the paper versions.

Having said that, I got rid of my paper dictionary and thesaurus when I cleaned out my cube 10 years ago. I might have one somewhere in a box, but I couldn't find it if I wanted it right now.
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For me, that seems to be even more of an attraction with on-line sources. If I go to an on-line dictionary, or more likely wiki, or even youtube, there are all the links to related content. For a dictionary, the derivation of the word, synonyms, antonyms. For wiki I might look up an item, and they list the countries that produce that item, so I click on that country, and they mention x,y,z and an hour later I don't even remember where I started.

I used to have a paperback dictionary on my desk, I also haven't seen it in many years.

-ERD50
 
I'm one of the dinosaurs that still has two dictionaries on hand. One is the compact edition of the OED (needs a magnifying glass to read) and the other is Webster's Third unabridged. I still enjoy leafing through them, and when I look something up in the OED I thoroughly enjoy all the history and etymology.
 
Hmm... I missed two on the test. Had I gone with my first choices on those two I would have been 15/15. Even at 13/15 the test score indicated spelling OCD.

Fun test but most of these words were clearly spelled incorrectly! OOPS - there goes my old-school spelling background.

I always liked the following spelling/grammar phrase:

They're going there in their car.
 
Nemo2 said:
The study of insects is quite fascinating isn't it? :LOL:
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:LOL: I'm always afraid I'll make that error, hence I tend to avoid it, and use terms like:

'the derivation of the word'

I may not be educated enough to remember the proper use of entomology versus etymology, but I'm smart enough to know I don't know! ;)


Hmmm, 'ent' sounds like 'ant' - maybe I can remember it going forward!

-ERD50
 
15/15, but it could have been harder. In school as a kid, spelling correctly was taught as important. Most of my spelling errors now are because of my bad typing, not because of my knowledge for the correct spelling of a word. Spell-checker does help catch mistyped words, assuming the mistype is not another real word. As imoldernu's paragraph states.
 
Gumby said:
On a related note - does anyone still use a real paper dictionary? I keep one in my office, and just last week used it to look up an unfamiliar word in The Economist (griot).
Click to expand...

I have one on the bookshelf here but rarely use it. If I'm sitting at the keyboard it's just faster & easier to search on the word rather than go through the rigors of getting up out the chair, taking a step to the bookcase, opening the dictionary and looking it up.
 
harley said:
As a kid I would look up a word in the dictionary, then end up reading the entire page or two. Good way to learn words, and you don't get that from googling a spelling/definition. I used to do the same thing with encyclopedia entries. I would end up reading multiple pages after I looked up whatever I was after. I sort of miss that from the paper versions.
Click to expand...

A man after my own heart. When I was a kid, my brother and I fished an old set of Funk & Wagnalls encyclopedias out of the dumpster. I spent hours and hours reading them.
 
My original two sources of English grammer learning came from Mr Magoo and the dictionary. Memorization of spelling is not so great, and sententence structure, punctuation etc. is as I damn well feel like it at the moment, as evidenced by many mistakes. BTW I still have a pretty sron accent while speaking, mercifully it is yet to be identified by anyone as a Hungarian accent.

The initial learning curve started with a two page article in what in remember is the the New York Daily News about the FBI. It was a long and painful process.

At the beginninnig had to look up nearly every word in an English/Hungarian dictionary, then after a few paragraphs used mostly an English dictionary. The problem was that in order to understand the explanation (definition) generally had to look up about ten more words, which was true of the newly looked up. So overall roughly for each new word, had to look up between 60 to 120 new words initially, and many had to be looked up in translation as well. Bloody painful.

Anywhoo, it took about two months of several hours a day reading to get to the end of the article. A year and change later got drafted, I enlisted before the draft date, and truly advanced English learning commenced in the form of DI guidance, counseling and directions (look that up on youtube) and southern slang from fellow recruits in the barracks. Also learned in great detail how to describe nearly everything with F.. words and synonyms.

Also learned the Spanish words No Comprende, though those fellows had no trouble with understanding the command Fall Out, or Smoke em if you got them, or chow.

No I did not bother to take the test.
 
ls99 said:
My original two sources of English grammer learning came from Mr Magoo and the dictionary. Memorization of spelling is not so great, and sententence structure, punctuation etc. is as I damn well feel like it at the moment, as evidenced by many mistakes. BTW I still have a pretty sron accent while speaking, mercifully it is yet to be identified by anyone as a Hungarian accent.

The initial learning curve started with a two page article in what in remember is the the New York Daily News about the FBI. It was a long and painful process.

At the beginninnig had to look up nearly every word in an English/Hungarian dictionary, then after a few paragraphs used mostly an English dictionary. The problem was that in order to understand the explanation (definition) generally had to look up about ten more words, which was true of the newly looked up. So overall roughly for each new word, had to look up between 60 to 120 new words initially, and many had to be looked up in translation as well. Bloody painful.

Anywhoo, it took about two months of several hours a day reading to get to the end of the article. A year and change later got drafted, I enlisted before the draft date, and truly advanced English learning commenced in the form of DI guidance, counseling and directions (look that up on youtube) and southern slang from fellow recruits in the barracks. Also learned in great detail how to describe nearly everything with F.. words and synonyms.
....
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Our kids' parents-in-law all speak English as a second language (three different languages as the first language). You and all of them get a pass on spelling of English words--I have so much respect and admiration for the hard work in learning to speak English or any other language well enough to use it every day, all day.
 
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ls99 said:
Also learned in great detail how to describe nearly everything with F.. words and synonyms.
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:LOL: Buddy & I caught a couple rides, (all four of us were hitchhiking), in Turkey 53 years ago, with two German guys; one had worked in London as a waiter in order to improve his English.....it was his contention that F*** was the most flexible and multifaceted word he ever learned.

He figured it covered all eight parts of speech — verbs, nouns, pronouns, adverbs, adjectives, prepositions, conjunctions, and interjections.......and, whatever the context it was used in, people automatically knew exactly what was meant.
 
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ls99 said:
My original two sources of English grammer learning came from Mr Magoo and the dictionary. Memorization of spelling is not so great, and sententence structure, punctuation etc. is as I damn well feel like it at the moment, as evidenced by many mistakes. BTW I still have a pretty sron accent while speaking, mercifully it is yet to be identified by anyone as a Hungarian accent. ...
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Interesting. I spent a few weeks in Hungary, and I'm not sure I could place a Hungarian accent. Sort of a blend of the Eastern European Polish/Czech accent and a Turkish/Greek accent?


Bestwifeever said:
Our kids' parents-in-law all speak English as a second language (three different languages as the first language). You and all of them get a pass on spelling of English words--I have so much respect and admiration for the hard work in learning to speak English or any other language well enough to use it every day, all day.
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Agreed. Geez, I struggle finding the right terms in the language I've spoken my whole life. I'd be scared to try to converse in another language - the twist of a phrase in English can completely change the meaning. I'd be in constant fear of saying exactly the opposite of what I meant, and/or insulting people. I am amazed that people can pick this up if they weren't born into it.

-ERD50
 
I'm very ocd for spelling. Interesting that spellcheck tried to change ocd to odd??
Recently received a pre-release novel from an author I enjoy reading and find about 6 misspellings and misused words. He was very surprised since he paid a proof reader to catch these. But I usually can catch misspells since they stand out to me.
 
folivier said:
He was very surprised since he paid a proof reader to catch these. But I usually can catch misspells since they stand out to me.
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Twenty years ago my late wife and I temporarily operated a B&B on an island in British Columbia.....the local Chamber of Commerce/Tourist Bureau (or whatever they called themselves), had a color tourism brochure printed incorporating a variety of outlets and tourism draws - it was full of misspellings.

Went to their office and asked why they didn't proofread - "Oh, yes we did" was the response....to which I replied that putting out crap like that after it was (supposedly) proofread was an even worse reflection on them than saying it hadn't been done at all.
 
I worked as a proofreader for a couple of weeks many (many many) years ago. They made us read back to front so we weren't distracted by meaningful sentences. This was just for misspellings, they had another group for homonyms and grammar. Worst job ever (except food service).
 
I got 4 wrong, but I am not a native speaker of English. I spent the first half of my life back home in Asia, then second half in Los Angeles. Turns out, my language skills for both my native tongue and English are poor. Pretty frustrating actually.
 
Nemo2 said:
Tluciffid eb dluow tnorf ot kcab gnidaer. ;)
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lol!. It would actually have been "difficult be would front to back reading", which might actually explain Yoda's speech patterns. He was a proofreader before going into Jedi-ing.
 
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