Not so, however, at Home Depot, where there is almost nothing Interesting to me. While Rick can happily spend an hour or two there, I become restless and fidgety after about ten minutes. And that is without signs like this one:
Groan.
(I'm having flashbacks from my teaparty sign days. Remember those?)
How could things go so wrong on such a simple sign?
Now, stipulating that Idems means Items, as in "pieces, things, goods, gadgets", how can such entities be Selective as in "choosy, judicious, discriminating, or discerning"?
And do not even get me started on that asterisk.
Goodbye, Home Depot. I've decided to become more Selective in where I spend my time. You and I are no longer an Item*.
*But Rick will never quit you.
cone
Oh thank God the Serpent post is not longer first!!
ReplyDeleteAnd this one? Priceless. I may need to start using Selective in that manner.
Meanwhile, where are the manager(s)? He/She/They should be (somewhat) educated and take offense at their employee's (or employees' - depending on how many it took to create this sign) attempt. I would have to continue to visit Home Depot if for no other reason than a good laugh in the bleak mid-winter.
Vera--I know. That toilet snake made me shudder every time.
DeleteI think you're overestimating the average manager at Home Depot. He/She is probably completely disinterested in both the grammar/structure of any signage created by employees and the correctness of same. As Ortizzle pointed out in the last Home Depot sign post, their pay scale is less than rewarding, so it is likely that (somewhat) educated people are working elsewhere. Or that the educated persons feel they are not being paid to care.
Dhat is a spelling misdake? I didn't even nodice.
ReplyDeleteAlly Bean--Do you look good in orange? I have a career opportunity for you. ;-)
DeleteOof - I think I'm going to start carrying a sharpie in my purse so I can correct signs like this. Except that I hate shopping so much that I hardly ever notice signs. Frankly, it's amazing that I don't run into other customers more often.
ReplyDeleteBug--I do have a Sharpie in my purse, but I have given up on The American Public. I wish I could be as oblivious as you, but decades of grading papers has ruined me.
DeleteI have a real love/hate relationship with Home Depot. So many things! So impossible to find most of them!
ReplyDeleteWe have a Costco with a gas station less than ten minutes away and I consider it our second home.
Gina--I wish Costco were closer. Ours is 20 minutes away (by interstate). But the olive oil I get there is worth the trip. (Not their brand, but one I have only found there.) Honestly, if Rick didn't have a membership through work, I could live without Costco, I think. But there's just the two of us.
DeleteI feel like you do about Home Depot when it comes to finding things. I know they think it is "organized." They would be wrong.
I think for two Costco is a bit much, as well. But we have a hungry teen-aged boy, so he eats everything in sight and is so much easier to have more.
DeleteI am sure that when we are empty-nesters, we will rethink the membership.
I take that back, my husband will never get over the gas that is at least twenty cents a gallon cheaper than everywhere else.
Gina--I drive a Prius and my husband drives a Toyota Highlander hybrid. We still get jacked about cheap gas. (And you should see how fast the line forms behind me at the pumps. They know how fast my car fills up!)
DeleteI have a chef friend who likes the Kirkland brand of olive oil. I am curious what brand you find there that you love? I don't have a Costco membership, but I know people that do, so I could go if I had a reason.
ReplyDeleteHome Depot is depressing, in that the employees don't seem to know anything about the products. I want someone who can point me toward what I am looking for, and I've not had good luck in that respect. I like their garden dept. For other items, I generally find myself at one of our local Ace Hardware stores, or perhaps Orchard.
The sign is horrid. I'm sorry you were exposed to it.
J@jj--I love the Bellucci label. It's a Greek extra virgin olive oil. Very intense and fruity. I haven't tried the Kirkland label; the Bellucci was recommended to me, so I tried that and haven't had a reason to try the other.
DeleteOur Home Depot is hit and miss with regard to knowledgeable help in the various departments. But Rick is All-Knowing about almost everything construction-related, so we aren't often at a disadvantage.
Thank you for your sympathy. Truly, it is sometimes painful encountering that level of Wrong.
Bad spelling on signs (or malapropisms) are so painful, and I have to put up with this crap in Spanish as well. My students are always coming to me with stuff they see in Spanish that is just beyond hideous. I can’t even read the comment sections on news articles anymore; the ignorance is appalling. Just saw a comment from a woman talking about her “lively hood” and that you didn’t need to be a “rocket sciencetist” to figure it out what was going on.
ReplyDeleteAnd look who we now have to improve the educational standard in the country! Betsy got off to a good start by tweeting a quote from “W.E.B. Du Bois” as “W.E.B. DeBois.” An hour later, it was corrected with this text: “Our deepest apologizes for the earlier typo.” So maybe Betsy needs to try to find those pencils so she can hand-write stuff and erase her mistakes before they are put out on a Twitter blast from the Dept. of Education.
I think it is time for another post by the Defender of the Language, and I have a suggestion for a mini-topic: the use of the derogatory suffix -tard, as in “libtard” and other variants. I find that so offensive and ignorant. It bothers me even worse than bad spelling because it takes being a pinhead to a whole new level. *sigh*
HOME DEPOT: Never go there. Except with Mr. O., sometimes, because he practically lives there. His job, sadly.
Ortizzle--I miss the Defender. Thanks for mentioning her.
DeleteThe Vast And Massive Ignorance of the Public At Large continues to be galling. It is exacerbated by the Facebook and by comments sections, the latter being places which I used to go for entertainment, but now assiduously avoid due to them being carpet-bombed by right-wing idiots who are too deeply stupid to know that the insane moron they voted into the White House is working to enact policy that will damage them the most.
(Taking a breath. And a gulp of coffee.)
I saw a Google News story re: the W.E.B. DuBois error. I'm sure they focused much too intently upon getting all three dots in the W.E.B. and merely sailed through the DuBois blithely and with the mistaken assurance that they were smugly home free. She is a Huge Doofus. The whole republican party is criminally negligent at this point.
Home Depot: My dear, handsome, and liberal-voter nephew Jacob works there in the warehouse while he puts himself through college. "Aunt Nance," he assures me, "I don't make any signs, and I'm never out on the floor." I have suggested to Rick that we begin frequenting Lowe's, but he hates its trafficky location. He knows that he will be going to HD solo more often.
I like your fun post. But I should be careful because English is my 3rd language and mistakes are easy – at least I don’t confuse items and idems. Just to make sure though I used to have my husband proof read my posts, but unfortunately he has Alzheimer’s now, so he cannot correct me. Luckily, when I wrote my “immigrant story” on The Guardian newspaper, his sister, who was an English professor at Ohio State University, corrected my English. But my blog posts now could have some mistakes.
ReplyDeleteI am a happy Costco customer where I buy my kitty litter and big bags of bird seeds.
Vagabonde--Bonjour et bienvenue! Je parle un peu de Francais.
DeleteCertainly, mistakes among nonnative speakers are to be expected. And I wouldn't be so quick to criticize if that were the case. I'm pretty sure that's not the situation here, and even if it were, I think management should do its job and A) not have that person make signs; or B) make sure the signs are correct in his/her department.
Costco is full of happy customers! (And huge bags of...Everything.) I, too, buy huge bags of birdseed, but not there. I have a local Rural King store where I shop for that, and as a bonus, this time of year, can also visit charming baby ducks and chicks there. Bonus!
I visited your blog, and I was so captivated by your recent post (well done!), that I forgot to leave a comment. I am on my way back right now.