Monday, September 20, 2010

Clearing Up

Okay, before my Europe post, (which will be coming hopefully soon) I think I owe some explanation to some people. If you have known me pretty well recently, you will have realized that I have an annoying habit of correcting people whenever they say something like "Our team consisted of me, Tom, Dick, and Harry" to "Our team consisted of Tom, Dick, Harry and I".

Understand?

Well, I was just thinking about it just now, and I decided to Google the subject to confirm that I was doing the right thing. (I wasn't even sure that whole time I had the habit, Jia En's the one who taught me)

And well, here are the results of my search:

Consider the following sentence: You and I should have lunch.

Is the correct form of this sentence You and I ... or You and me ...? This is a common source of confusion in English.

Fortunately, there's an easy way to decide whether to use I or me in such sentences. All you have to do is drop the word you then try the sentence with I and me one at a time. For example:

  • I should have lunch.
  • Me should have lunch.

Clearly the preferred form in this case is I; thus, the original sentence was correct to use you and I.

Here's another example: He'll blame you and I. Drop the word you then try the sentence with Ime one at a time, like so: and

  • He'll blame I.
  • He'll blame me.

You can see that the second of these is correct. This means that the original sentence should have been: He'll blame you and me.

Easy.

On a related note, when using phrases such as you and me, you and I or them and us, it has traditionally been considered courteous to place the reference to yourself last. For example, we prefer:

  • He'll ask you and me later.

over:

  • He'll ask me and you later.
So there you have it. I would like to sincerely apologize for all the times I'd wrongly corrected your grammar. In that sense, I actually wronged your grammar. Not in all the cases, of course, but perhaps half of the time. Heheh.

In the future, I shall make an effort to consider your sentences before voicing my corrections.

Jun Shern out.

*Static*

Saturday, September 4, 2010

We've Lost Another One That We'd Sent With A Gun

Jimmy's mother went to Capitol Hill
So she could fill her heart up with joy
Maybe shake a few hands while she's there
And tell him, thank you sir for taking my boy

-Two Weeks From Twenty, Yellowcard

The holidays are here, thank the gods. I know, I enjoy school and all that, but honestly, another week or two of it would just kill me off.

I realize that I haven't got enough time to study. Going to Europe from the 9th to the 19th this month isn't exactly a decision made in the best interest of my studies, but yeah. It's well worth sacrificing a few passes to visit a strange and foreign land.

But seriously, my studies are in a mess. If my current schooling standards show up in the final terms, my whole life will be thrown into jeopardy. Don't you roll your eyes at me, I'm serious. If you ask me what is the percentage of the things I understand(rather, have been sufficiently awake enough to listen to) out of the things the teachers have taught us this term, it will (when rounded off to 1 significant figure) be zero. Absolute zero. Sub zero. Ground zero. Zero, Jack Skellington's dog from The Nightmare Before Christmas.

That's Zero.

But anyways, I promise to type out a nice long post about Europe when I get back. Perhaps not immediately, cos I'll be getting back at around 12 midnight, the night before school starts, and I still have to go to school, but eventually I will.

It'll be nice, long, and full of pictures.

Until then, let me show you something I dreamed up while studying chemistry.

Presenting...
The CoMical Flask!

Jun Shern out.

*Static*