My freshman year of college, I wandered into my Sociology class to find the following phrase written on the whiteboard:
To error is human.
Looking around at the complacent looks on my fellow classmates, I soon realized I was apparently the only student who found the irony positively hilarious.
(Feel free to mentally insert snide remarks about the quality of professors at Utah State here, as he didn't find anything wrong with it, either. Add to the list another professor--PhD from Stanford, mind you-- who regularly used the "word" [Sean-quotes intended] irregardlessly. Sigh.)
I've never claimed to be perfect in my use of grammar or punctuation. I make plenty of mistakes, but that doesn't stop me from being persnickety. For those people who don't roll their eyes at signs like one seen near my home that read "Pet's Welcome", ignore the following. For Wendy, Scott, Melinda, and the other apostrophe nerds, read on. This is why we get along so well.
Today at work we began using a new program that automatically lays out the format of our clinical notes with prompts to fill in specific information. Ideally, the program should standardize our documentation and save us time. Now, documentation isn't always pretty; we usually write in third person, and occasionally a sentence fragment is appropriate. I get that. The problem I'm having is that the templates are full of grammatical errors, and because I'm a bit of a brat, it makes me crazy. For example, a sentence may read "Social worker met with ____", and then there is a drop down box with options. My options in this case are:
Patient
Family
patient and family
Everyone else in the department will likely leave the sentence to read: "Social worker met with Patient". Unless I have a patient named Patient, I'll be scrolling up at the end to fix that stupid capital P. Other sentences switch nouns in the middle of things so that it doesn't make any sense at all. For example, "notification letter was given and chose Sunset Manor Assisted Living". I don't care if the average person can figure it out. As far as I'm concerned, the day my notification letter chooses a living facility is the day I'm outsourced to China. Or in this case, china.
4 comments:
I just hope your job is never outsourced to Chyna, the female wrestler. Sorry, "wrestler."
you really shouldnt let such thing's bother you.
oh man. you belong in my family. i come from a long line of grammer snobs! (i'm sure i make all sorts of mistakes though on my blog -- like not capitalizing anything that should be capitalized -- i just don't take the time to fix anything!)
Alright so I haven't read in a while... I've been busy living it up in Vegas!! Yes after the Warp Tour incident's, your toe's and feet for that matter will forever be tainted. I didn't bother to read all the comment's left, so if someone has already said this ohh well... "dressed to the nines" --> I have heard it is because it took nine yards of fabric to make a suit. I can't prove that, but you've got my two cents:) And a few worthless 's and comma's, to give you a fit!
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