Eats, Shoots & Leaves

For some reason I have a knack for remembering the oddities of English grammar.

My intent today is not to regale you with examples of all those grammarian law-breakers out there. Surely a website is dedicated to such a topic. I am simply annoyed that one of my favorite commercials has been edited:



I love how as soon as their name leaves his mouth he realizes that he doesn't know how to pluralize it. Even I, the resident grammarian, have trouble with pluralizing last names that end in s or z.

Here is an excerpt from one of my favorite websites:

"When a family name (a proper noun) is pluralized, we almost always simply add an "s." So we go to visit the Smiths, the Kennedys, the Grays, etc.When a family name ends in s, x, ch, sh, or z, however, we form the plural by added -es, as in the Marches, the Joneses, the Maddoxes, the Bushes, the Rodriguezes. Do not form a family name plural by using an apostrophe; that device is reserved for creating possessive forms.

When a proper noun ends in an "s" with a hard "z" sound, we don't add any ending to form the plural: "The Chambers are coming to dinner" (not the Chamberses); "The Hodges used to live here" (not the Hodgeses). There are exceptions even to this: we say "The Joneses are coming over," and we'd probably write "The Stevenses are coming, too." A modest proposal: women whose last names end in "s" (pronounced "z") should marry and take the names of men whose last names do not end with that sound, and eventually this problem will disappear."

See? Clear as mud.

Sadly, Orbitz has since dropped the pluralizing gag in deference to those misunderstanding the joke. It is not making fun of the name, only the pluralization of names with similar endings. It would have worked just as well if they were the Joneses.

Sigh.