Well, there's always somebody isn't there? I have answered exactly one letter so far, and already I have some shrill little harridan on my case.
Of course, this being an email response her letter makes no difference without the passages she quoted from my reply. (sigh) So the words in bold are from my original response to her letter.
So that we all know, from this point on, that is verboten, okay? No quoties.
First of all, the word you are after is spelled grammar.
Oh, did I have a little typo in that message? I'm *so* *sorry*. I can't tell you how *bad* I feel about that. Fuck you.
Secondly, you are operating under a mistaken apprehension that the spelling of the word blond changes according to the gender of the person it is referring to. That just ain't so.
Wow... you're mighty uninformed for a guy who presumes to run an advice column. Since your response was plain wrong and therefore of no help, I found the answer myself.
It seems we acquired the words blond and blonde from middle French and simply adopted the French way of handling adjectives along with those words. We did the same with brunet and brunette. The current edition of Webster's Dictionary says writers are required to differentiate between genders in the spelling of blond(e), both as an adjective and a noun.
However, in order to deal with the problem I raised, many careful users of English opt to use the different gender spellings only when using "blond(e)" as a noun, and use the "blond" spelling whenever the word is used as an adjective.
It also describes a man with light eyes.
Now, you see, *that* is an interesting piece of information and the sort of edifying comment one expects to hear from a competent giver of advice. Of course, since this came from you, I fully intend to research it before believing it for a second.
Now there are those who are gonna tell me that this is a sexist construction. That OF COURSE the masculine form of the word is the fall back. That is, naturally, horseshit. Blonde is a whole different concept from blond, just in the same way that brown and brunette are different.
Again, we are confronted by the astounding wrongness of you. I don't know what dictionary you're using (or if you know how to use one), but you might consider one which was written by a native speaker of English.
If it's the latter, you have self-esteem issues, and need to check that out.
Exposure to you has made me feel much better about myself, in as much as I'm not you.
I hope I've been helpful.
Not in the way you intended, but yes.
Suddenly A Complete Know-it-all
Dear SACK,
This brings me to one of my pet peeves. I am completely fucking flabbergasted and bewildered at the motives of anyone who would write an advice columnist about something they already know the answer to. Is it to reassure themselves of thier own superiority? Is it a test of my worthiness? I mean, honestly, what the fuck is up with this? Do you want my help or what?
That said, I admit that the truth is maybe a little more flexible on the issue of the whole blonde/blond thing than I led on. But my source is as good as yours, and I actually talked with an honest-to-god linguist who specializes in etymology and she thought I was closer to right than you were, so whatever. Some questions don't have definitive right answers. I never claimed to be an expert on the English language. I'm just an ex-thug answering questions for your amusement here. If your life depends on which tense you need a verb in, call a specialist.
If some guy is following you around and won't leave you alone, and you're scared to go to your car at night, I'm your guy. That's a situation on which I have experience. So, if I get any more whiny bitch letters about how wrong I am, I will find the person responsible and I will put them in the ground. And I'll print their picture right here. Test me. I don't have time for this shit.
So, SACK should consider herself lucky. She got the one and only warning shot.
And now, onto a new letter...
Dear Val,
This problem has been bothering me for a while now, and it has finally hit the point where I just can't keep it to myself. I need your advice.
I have a fish tank, and have successfully made it a good home for some dozen or so fish, who have all been thriving... except for the plecostamus. For some reason, I just can't seem to keep my plecostamus alive. My plecostamus DIED for the fifth time today! (I mean, today is the fifth time that a plecostamus has up & died on me. I really doubt the same plecostamus has died 5 times... unless fish get reincarnated as.. well... more fish.)
I've been told that plecostami are good hardy fish, and it's difficult to actually kill them. They eat algae, for goodness sake! It's not like I'm underfeeding them, or overfeeding them, or feeding them the wrong sort of food. There's sufficient algae in the average fish tank to keep a plecostamus well fed. It's like having a catfish... it's not rocket science to take care of one. And none of my other fish seem to be having any problem with the conditions in my fishtank, so I know it's not a pH problem, or too much nitrate or ammonia.
What am I doing wrong? Please help!
- Too Many Fish, Not Enough Street-Savvy
Well, Mr./Ms. NESS,
The answer is right under your nose. You have a rat in your tank. What you didn't tell me is what other kinds of fish you keep in that water, and that makes all the difference.
My father used to talk about the old world, and all the troubles that made his family decide to leave it. All the old grudges and vendettas and politics and religious struggles. We came to the new world to get away from all that. That was the theory.
The thing was, that when all the immigrants got here, they brought all that stuff with them, and kept it all up over here. What could have been a great fresh new start for everyone was undermined by human nature. Pretend your tank is a tenement building on the lower east side of New York in 1901, crammed with immigrants from all over the world, forced to learn to live together in a strange new land. You, NESS, are the bumbling Irish cop walking the beat. Certainly they behave when you're around, but the moment you leave it is the law of the jungle.
Doubtless, you have some tough gang of fish that doesn't brook outsiders, especially those filthy plecostami. They only take jobs that could go to honest hardworking fish and they mess up the tank like wild animals.
So I recommend you see how the plecostami do in a tank of their own. I'm not in favour of segregation or anything, but until decent plecostami can overcome the vicous lies and stereotypes perpetrated againt them, thanks to the bad works done by a few orgainzed hoods, it's really safest for them.
Now, if you find they are still dropping like flies, you need to suspect that it's some kind of internal feud, maybe between families, and stay the hell out of it. Some of these feuds are six hundred years old, and you can't hope to fix it in a day, or anything. I hear that Angelfish are pretty.
