Word problems

Good morning, everyone. If a Denver bound train leaves Santa Fe at 3:05 am and has an airborne pathogen on it that kills those near it in 47 minutes, how glad are you that you took a plane instead? Sure, it cost more, but think of all the benefits. No, gentle readers, that's not what I mean by "word problems." Rather, I speak of the inevitable strains that people have with our language. This is their story.

I was walking to get some food for lunch last week, and I passed by a store that had really ramped up their Easter items. They were doing everything they could to increase foot traffic: cute things spilling out the door, bright colors, and a sandwich board on the sidewalk to ensure that everyone knew they were there. I found one minor problem with the display though. On the big, hand-written sign designed to lure those in need of goodies into the store, it read: "WE OPEN!"

I know it's an honest mistake, and I've probably done similar things more times than I'm aware of, but it still struck me as humorous. I felt like walking in and saying, "I'm so glad you open. I in need of stuff you selling." I didn't though, because it would've been unnecessarily mean and (more importantly) I was pretty damn hungry.

I've seen many hilarious typos through the years. Sometimes, it's a language barrier thing and not a typo per se, but they're still pretty funny. I know it sounds mean of me to make fun of non-native English speakers' use of said language, but ask yourselves this: If you owned a business in a country where you didn't speak the language well, would you advertise with just your limited knowledge or would you run it by some native speakers before sending it out to prospective customers?

For example, one of my favorite menus my family has ever received in the mail was for a Chinese restaurant. It had not one but two fantastic errors on it. First, it announces to would-be patrons, "We delivery!" Second, and much better in my opinion, is this assertion: "For your dinning pleasant!" At least they got the first two words right.

In a somewhat similar situation, my wife was once in a Chinese restaurant in another country. Naturally, that means they had a doubly-hard task of getting their English correct. Still, translating "hot and sour soup" as the baffling "soup and hot soup" makes me laugh. In fact, neither of us has called that soup by its correct name for years upon years now. We never order it, but we always point out to each other that "soup and hot soup" is on the menu.

One of my all-time gaffes though is from something my mom and dad once saw. Someone who was billing herself as a mind reader of sorts had this to say about her services: "I am a true physic!" You don't need the gift of second sight to see that there's a spelling error in there. While it's a minor one, it still turns a would-be Carnac the Magnificent into Stephen Hawking. Big difference, no?

I'm sure everyone out there has seen errors of this kind in his or her lifetimes. Which ones have stuck? Lay 'em on me, brothers and sisters.

It's hard for me to be too tough on people for making these errors. We've all been there, I'm sure, when a word just doesn't look right even when it is. I most remember this happening with the word "problem." I was making a poster for a science class in high school and needed to outline the scientific method. The first step was defining the problem. I typed out that word on my computer, printed it out on my dot matrix printer, ripped off the holey things on the sides, and was about to rubber cement it on. But I stopped first, because the word didn't look right. Problem. Problem. The "blem" part in particular just seemed wrong to me. Not just wrong - it seemed totally made up. There I sat for a solid five minutes contemplating the problem that "problem" presented. The more I stared at it, the more made up it felt. After those five minutes, I was convinced that the word didn't really exist. It did of course, and my mom came in soon after and confirmed that it was spelled correctly.

I'm sure this happens to each and every one of you out there. Can you remember any words in particular that got you? "Deny" almost always makes me pause and question its authenticity, for example. (Honestly, I so badly want to plug it into Word and do a spellcheck right now, because it just looks so fake to me. How can that be how to spell that word?) I can't explain it, but I'm really hoping this is something that occurs in more heads than mine.

That said, I'm off to do real work. Have a great Monday, folks. I'll be back with more problems with words and a new installment of Guess the Fakey tomorrow. How do I know? Physics, baby, physics.