Apex, North Carolina, is a modest town—or at least it proudly thinks it is. There are some
good people in Apex. But, like any growing burb, Apex has its rough sorts, its tough sorts, its gruff,
grammar-challenged sorts. Like any other citizen consumed with worry for our withering way with
words, I do my duty. I am a Grammar Cop. My name is Friday, Joel Friday.
It started off as an easy day, so easy in fact that it occurred to me I might finish my work
early. I started off with two “Hopefully” cases. (“Hopefully” modifies a verb, often incorrectly.)
“Hopefully the oranges won’t rot.” Are the oranges hopeful, or are YOU hopeful. “I am hopeful
the oranges won’t rot” is certainly different than, “Hopefully, the oranges won’t rot.” “Hopefully,
the airplane won’t crash” was the other infraction. How could an airplane act in a hopeful manner?
Sigh.
Now, there are indeed instances where hopefully is correct, e.g., “Hopefully, the concert
crowd waited for the rain delay to clear.”
The other case I had this morning was the ubiquitous nauseous versus nauseated. The
standard grammar rule used to be this: If you are feeling discomfort, perhaps you are nauseated.
One who is nauseous is one who is causing some other being to be nauseated.
A classic response to someone who claims, “I am really nauseous,” is to answer with, “I
couldn’t agree more.”
“Jack, I’m nauseous this morning.”
“Larry, I don’t think you are. You’re fine this morning. Now, yesterday was a different matter.
You wore your old gym clothes in the office and I thought you were quite nauseous, mostly nauseous,
and, in fact, totally nauseous. I was nauseated all evening.”
A “Nausea infraction” involves only a warning, whereas a “Hopefully violation” is considered
a misdemeanor.
While my partner, Bill, was checking out a rumor from an informant about a possible “its
versus it’s” violation, I overheard a blatant use of lie/lay/lain. I cringed; I choked; I coughed; and
then I confronted the lingual lunatics.
“You there,” I shouted, “lying on othe sidewalk,” as I spied two teenagers on a blanket; they
were looking up at the early morning smog. “What are you doing here?”
“We’re just laying on the sidewalk looking at the sky,” they responded, clearly annoyed at me.
“You’re lying.”
“No, I’m telling the truth.”
“You aren’t laying anything … I see no eggs, I see no flatware or silverware that you may lay
on a table. I don’t think you’re lying—that is, you are trying to tell the truth—but you certainly are
lying on the sidewalk.”
“Could I lie on a street bench?”
“Certainly.”
“Could I lie on a train?”
“Sure, if you had a sleeping berth and/or you weren’t telling the truth.”
“So I lied yesterday?”
“No, you lay yesterday.”
“I lay yesterday?”
“Well, if you said a falsehood, then you lied yesterday.”
“Do I lie something down?”
“You lay something down. In fact, yesterday you laid down a floor mat, or you laid down the
law for a roommate. You have laid in the past; and you will be laying someday in the future.”
“So … today I lie in my bed; yesterday I lay in my bed; I have … then what?” she asked.
“You have lain in bed, and you have been lying in bed.” I lay on the bench next to them.
“So, again, are you telling the truth, or are you lying?”
“I am lying, I am telling the truth,” I chuckled.
“Friday, Friday, come in Friday,” squelched my Radio Communications Device, “We have a desert/
dessert conflict on Park Avenue, an intense discussion on wake, woke, waken, and awaken—I’d
avoid that one, if I were you—and an argument on how to use myriad correctly. Any help would be
… um … helpful.
I ran to the car. People saw me run to the car. While I was running to the car, I suddenly
reached it. Indeed, I had run to the car. Happy was I.
I like being a Grammar Cop. Most people appreciate being told the folly of their ways. And
it helps me trying to be generous, aiming to instruct and lift up, not condemn or tear down. Grammar
is fun and I want people to experience that .
Hooray for Grammar! Cheers for Grammar! Accolades for Grammar! Now, get back to your
writing!