Off of

Retired teacher of English and self-styled pedant extraordinaire!
As for 'looking out the window' and similar constructions, these are not just American usage. I grew up in Scotland using them and no teacher ever corrected us.
We all have our linguistic bugbears and this is a fine place to let them off (not 'off of') the leash!

Spelling angers me too, I will not read posts with sloppy spelling or with words spelt phonetically and as for advertisements where people can't be bothered to find the correct spelling of the object they have for sale........they certainly lose me as a potential customer

Ex-teacher says she can't bear it when she asks her sons how they are and they answer 'I'm good'. Her response is I'm not asking about your behaviour, I'm asking after your health. They answer the same when asked if they would like a drink. Talking of drinks, I am sure it has been mentioned before, but my toes curl when I hear 'can I get?' in any coffee shop.

I agree with so many of these messages.What can be done about poor grammar when we are bombarded with it on T.V. and in our newspapers?

If I hear 'No worries' again I shall vomit

I really did think I was the only want who still loves to hear the English language spoken properly! Agree totally with all of the above!

Oh yes, and what about 'next up'?!

I agree with all of the comments. Every one of them drives me mad. The pronunciation of the letter H as haitch instead of aitch is another one. Are we all just too old?

Has anyone noticed the trend for saying 'atherletes'? I'm going to have a trying time when the Olympics come along.

HannahLoisLuke you read my mind! Haitch drives me mad, as does my current bete noir 'strugguling' instead of struggling. I had to leave another forum because the comments were unintelligible. I also have made a vow not to vote for any politician who starts a sentence with 'look', or my personal pet hate 'what you have to understand is'.Patronising or what? I'm a tolerant happy person,honestly!!

How about the 'I reached out to him' which I first heard on the US version of House of Cards, and is now used widely in the American press/media to replace 'I phoned / contacted him'. Has it reached the UK yet? I find it totally ridiculous.

Why is it that all threads in Pedants' Corner end up with the same complaints? And most of them nothing to do with the original subject of the thread.

SO GOOD to read that I am not the only one who is driven mad by all of the above! Angharad56, I also loathe politicians who begin with "Let me be clear about this ...."!!

Our teacher of English in the 1950s insisted on "different from" not "to", "bored with", never starting a sentence with "and" or "but", "all right" being two words, etc, and that's without getting started on "it's" only meaning it is.

Now I have just read the book by Oliver Kramm of The Times, called "Accidence will Happen, the non-pedantic guide to English language". Almost all the rules I was taught he says aren't justified. It made fascinating reading but no way shall I, now aged 70, change my ways.

I borrowed the book from the Library - some of you might like to do the same.

Reminds me of my children, now adults, saying what I thought was ' I can't be asked' however as I attempted to correct, transpired I had misheard/understood and they were saying something different (arsed)! Even worse!!
I dislike the new 'can I get' which can be heard more and more frequently in restaurants cafes etc, instead of 'I would like or can or may I have.' I feel the response should be 'help yourself it's out in the kitchen/on the top shelf'!!
Language changes through time but it can seem very sloppy to some of us.

I'm no linguistics expert but I think 'off of' is grammatically acceptable. You wouldn't be offended by 'on to' e.g. I fell on to the bed. Or 'in to'. 'Off of' is, perhaps, an archaic term? It has fallen out of common useage in this country but is still much used in the USA. Their form of English came from this country more than two hundred years ago and has been preserved to some extent. I was in a little shop in St Helens (the Lancashire one) a few years ago and the shopkeeper watched me for a while and then commented, "You're wondering what f't buy!" (what for to buy) That was dialect, archaic but grammatically acceptable. We simply don't use that form of words in standard English any more. Anything that departs from what we're used to can grate on the ear. I agree about 'bored of'. The one I hate most is 'would, could, should of' but I think that is regional to some extent. I've tried to get it across to children in school by using sentences such as: I have gone shopping. I could, would, should have gone shopping. You wouldn't say, 'I of gone shopping'!

Apostrophes in plurals! Or should I say apostrophe's in plural's? Aaargh! Surely the rules on apostrophes are not that difficult to learn?

GranE - that's the one that drives me crazy! A few weeks ago we saw a blackboard in the local garden centre advertising their breakfast menu, included in which was 'a selection of jam's'. I rubbed the apostrophe out with my finger, hubby told me to come away and behave.
Another one is 'get go' as in 'it's been like that from the get go' rather than just saying 'the beginning'.
Oh, I love this thread, could go on forever, I think.

I agree with all the complaints here and would like to add my own pet hate. In an advertisement on television, about reclaiming PPI, the man says that the banks have money "which belongs to you and I". It drives me wild every time.

AngieLC, or they start a sentence with " basically" .

I agree with all of the above; I'm a stickler for good grammar and spelling and have to hold myself back from correcting people I don't even know on Facebook!
It bugs me that in the last year whenever I listen to interviews, when the interviewer asks a question the interviewee frequently begins their replying sentence with, 'So... blahblahblah.'

Mine is 'got'. No such word - it's 'have'.
Arch offenders - John Humphries on Todaywho should know better, and Alexander Armstrong on Pointless who both regularly trot out 'have got'

All my pet hates have been highlighted here! In addition to the "get go", I also wince when I hear "Oh yes, Johnny, he's the "GO TO" for.." whatever it is. Cropping up a lot, almost as often as "back in the day" - what day?

Madmartha 'got' is a word - it's in many a dictionary!

shtudents! Even hear students refer to themselves as shtudents