Language is a lossy format.

[prillalar]

I am normally mild-mannered and tolerant and have in fact grown less rather than more curmudgeonly over the years. I pass over "discrete encounter" with consummate grace. I smile gently at "should of". I was positively delighted by "quadtriple bypass".

But when I see people write "loose" when they mean "lose", I want to buy a shotgun.

Comments

[tzikeh.livejournal.com]

Would you shoot through the extra "o" ?

[laurashapiro.livejournal.com]

I love the title of this post. (:

I'm less forgiving than you about this, as you know, but I suspect my blood pressure would be lower if I could adopt your attitude -- "loose"/"lose" is just one of the things that makes me want a shotgun.

[nestra.livejournal.com]

If you had a rocket launcher...

[thepouncer.livejournal.com]

Yes. I hate that, although there are some things I can overlook.

[octopedingenue]

I concur and suggest some form of bird- or buckshot for maximum pain infliction.

The upside is that "I don't want to loose you!" can all too often be an unintentionally hilarious statement when the protestor is the control freak in the relationship.

[kelly-yoyo.livejournal.com]

How do you feel about "wonderment"? Drives me batshit.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_inbetween_/]

Damn, and there I would never have made the three mistakes you strangely enough don't mind.

[greensilver.livejournal.com]

Now I'm trying to come up with sentences in which "loose" and "lose" are interchangeable. Hmm.

The coach decided not to retire, as he didn't want to let his team loose/lose.

Almost?

Discrete encounters (noun) - encounters which take place in motels with hourly rates.

[disutansu.livejournal.com]

Particle Beam Weapon.

*nods*

It's Adjective vs. Verb. Which will win?

[eliade.livejournal.com]

I smile gently at "should of".

I just saw that in a pro novel by a bestselling author with over 20 published novels. Gah.

[greenet.livejournal.com]

...*blinks* Wonder what a quadtriple bypass is. Is that like a two-four?

I hear you, sister.

[inapickle.livejournal.com]

For me it's "adverse" in place of "averse" and "taunt" instead of "taut", mostly.

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

"He was finding it hard to breath." <==shotgun worthy.


(Also, "weary" as this portmanteau combination of "wary" and "leery." Mama spank.)

[mad_maudlin]

Ah, but the loose/lose pair violates some basic generalizations of English spelling, specicially vowel length and <s>-voicing, so as a typo it's easy to understand. The "correct" (read: consistant) spelling for the pair should be "looce/loose," except that looks funny. "luce/luse," maybe?

[malograntum.livejournal.com]

For what it's worth, I think "luse" was once a common spelling variant (by "once" I mean "sometime around the Elizabethan era").

[mad_maudlin]

Ah, yes, those crazy Elizebethans with their wacky spelling...at least it was more or less phonemic back in the day.

[malograntum.livejournal.com]

Verb, Transitive. (http://www.livejournal.com/users/kageygirl/17448.html)

[deepfryerfire.livejournal.com]

I see your loose/lose and raise you one: "waist" and "waste". No, really- people actually *do* this. It gives you lovely sentences like "Kaidoh got out of the shower and wrapped a towel around his waste." Try getting *that* burning image out of your head in a jiffy.

[wickedcherub.livejournal.com]

You know, when I was in highschool and just discovering the Internet, I genuinely thought that 'loose' was the American spelling of 'lose' because I saw it so often.

[prillalar]

I think the buckshot might make that difficult. *g*

[prillalar]

Considering I saw the annoying error in the comments on an article on JPEG compression, it seemed appropriate.

And I can really recommend not being annoyed by stuff. It's made my life a lot better.

[prillalar]

Or even a red pen that would work on web pages!

[prillalar]

Most things I can overlook. I don't know why this one pings me. Hmm.

[prillalar]

Hee! You're right.

[prillalar]

I can't say I've seen that one, at least not recently. I don't think it gets used on Slashdot a lot. *g*