FOODIE FRIDAY for July 31, 2009

OK, I'm bitter. The lovely LadyStyx sent me this amusing misspelling, which I am going to mock the hell out of because seeing this recipe is making me hungry for strawberry shortcake, and I can't have strawberry shortcake because I'm allergic to cream.

So since I can't have this delicious, sweet strawberry shortcake, I'm going to be a bitter, bitter girl and make fun of this goofy misspelling that both the writer and her spell-checker should have picked up on and corrected. "Treet" just looks silly. It looks very much like "tweet," which is funny-looking and funny-sounding, too. The difference is that "tweet" is a real word AND "TREET" IS NOT. NOT AT ALL. YOU DON'T DESERVE TO HAVE THAT STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE, YOU ROTTEN WRITER!!!!!!!!!

OK. Calming down now...

So, on the topic of treats, what are your favorite treats? Mine are:

1. Shoo-Fly Pie
2. Refreshers candy (a fizzy British candy that, sadly, I don't think is being made anymore)
3. Rita's Italian Ice. But since I'm a Philly-area native, I call it Rita's Water Ice (which is also "Rita's Wooder Ice," if the Philadelphian who says those words has a particularly heavy Philly accent).

Happy Friday, everyone! And thanks to LadyStyx for spotting this silly misspelling!

Who's this "Hallday" dude?

The trade deadline is tomorrow, and as I write this post, Halladay (that's Halladay, not Hallday) is still with the Jays.

I like Halladay--when the Phillies were looking to trade for him, I was thrilled. But now that they've acquired the totally BILFalicious Cliff Lee, it means they're probably not still interested in pursuing Halladay. That's a good thing--because right now we no longer need another pitcher, and because we would have had to give up too many good prospects and one good pitcher to get Halladay (the Lee deal really was much better).

That being said, if Halladay does get traded, I hope for the Phillies' sake that he goes to some team they hardly play. I'm hearing that the Dodgers are interested in him, and dammit, the Dodgers are good enough already (not only that, but if it ends up being Phillies vs. Dodgers in the National League championship again this year, I don't want to see freakin' Halladay in their rotation, because he's awesome and he could do some damage against my boys).

I'm kinda interested to see exactly where Halladay might go. There's been so much build-up about him probably being traded, but we're getting close to the deadline, and now I'm kinda wondering if he'll even be traded at all... (I'll feel bad for him if he stays with the Jays, since they're not in contention this year, but still. STAY AWAY FROM THE TEAMS THAT THE PHILLIES REGULARLY PLAY, HALLADAY. I'll like you much better if you stay in the AL...)

Thanks to PAT at FanIQ for spotting this misspelling! (By the way, if you're a sports fan, and you haven't checked out FanIQ, you really need to go check it out. Like, NOW.)

Free what, exactly...?

Psst! I've finally figured out what Victoria's secret is...



...it's that she can't freakin' spell! ;)

Thanks, PETER, for spotting this error!

HUMP DAY GRAMMAR for July 29, 2009

OK--seriously, dude:

1) GROW A PAIR. Yeah, you heard me. All your sickeningly sweet chivalry-type nonsense is making me want to projectile vomit.

2. The sexiest guys are the ones who make fewest homonym errors.

3. This is a manakin (as opposed to a mannequin). And if you really want to see a website where these cute little creatures are dressed in lingerie...well, that's some messed up shit there, dude.

Happy Hump Day, you crazy kids! Please try to avoid finding any homonymically-challenged Hump Day partners. This has been a public service announcement from Red Pen, Inc.

Good news!

If you're a Red Pen, Inc. reader who uses Internet Explorer and who has been annoyed by the rather persistent Internet Explorer error that has been causing this page to go POOF! while you're trying to read it, you'll be pleased to know that the bug has been banished from our happy little land of grammar and snarkiness. (Fellow bloggers, if this is happening on your own blogs, just get rid of the Followers widget in your sidebar...the problem should go away right away.)

Happy reading... :)

TO/TOO/TWO TUESDAY for July 28, 2009

Hmmm. I'm torn between letting out the biggest *sigh* ever or the loudest scream I can manage. This is truly appalling:


I'm glad that somebody corrected this sign in the store. Perhaps if people see the corrected sign, they'll realize it might not be such a good idea to buy the product--after all, if its marketing materials are this bad, there's a good chance that the software itself might be as bad or worse. Yikes!

Thanks to AJ and LadyStyx for finding this picture on FAILblog and sending it to me!

MISSPELLING MONDAY for July 27, 2009

I've really never understood why the word "jewelry" is so difficult for people to spell. I've seen it misspelled many, many times. I usually see it misspelled as "jewelery"...however, YOURS TRULY found it misspelled a different way, as shown above.

I'm baffled as to why this word is so tough for people to spell correctly. I swear I see the word misspelled more often than spelled correctly. Why do you think that is? Am I crazy, and this is a really tough word to spell? Or is it a pretty simple word, and people are just ignorant about its proper spelling? (I notice the same thing happens with the word "definitely"--doesn't seem like too tricky of a word, yet SO many people misspell it, usually this way: definately. Eek.)

Thanks, YOURS TRULY, for spotting this spelling error!

FOODIE FRIDAY for July 24, 2009

Today's Foodie Friday treat comes to us from Winona. She says: ...description says that this makes "five mini cupcakes at a time" - yet the picture clearly shows a capacity of seven. Either way, I'm hungry!

Yeah, this is totally a mathematical FAIL! It's a proofreading FAIL, too. And I agree on the "hungry" thing. Thinking of cupcakes makes me hungry...for frosting. I don't (usually) want the whole cupcake--but I'll gladly eat the frosting off the top of it. Especially if it's the really sugary kind as opposed to the kind that's more like whipped topping.

Thanks, Winona...for finding this error and for making me hungry! (Now I have an excuse to go eat something sugary!) :) Happy Friday, everyone!

Yikes!

You guys, this one's a doozy. (Actually, it's 2 pictures, but they're from the same website. So I'm counting this as one colossal FAIL.)

You'll need to click the images in order to see them readably. (If you click an image, it'll pop up all big and pretty in a separate window. And yes, it's totally worth it.)

The first part:

The second part:

LEANNE found this one for us. Normally I'm content to just red pen one portion of a web page and leave the rest alone. But no. Not this time. This was just too damn hilarious (or sad, depending on how you look at it) to ignore.

Do people really pay these goobers to write dissertations? If so, the pay should be in Monopoly money.

The semicolon screw-ups. The weird sentence structure. The missed words. Oh, the hilarity of it all!

Thanks, LEANNE, for finding this crazy site for us!

A major league disagreement...

How many Rangers? Just this one--the pitcher? Didn't the rest of 'em help? Hamilton, Kinsler...get your hot selves on the field!

(I'm feeling a little snarky about baseball tonight since my Twins got clobbered and my Phillies lost. Can't blame the Phillies, since they'd been on a 10-game winning streak...they were bound to lose at some point. But those Twins? Good thing they're really hot, otherwise I might start to hate 'em, since this is the second rather embarrassing loss they've had this week. Sigh.)

HUMP DAY GRAMMAR for July 22, 2009

Sometimes bad search engine strings happen to good people.

The fine, funny folks over at ProgressiveBoink.com (a name that sounds totally appropriate for inclusion in a Hump Day Grammar post) have listed some of their search engine strings* on their website. And they are hi-freakin'-larious. Especially the last one on the list...



I'm a girl, so I don't have a penis. But if I were a guy and I did have a penis, and I happened to be the sort of person who misplaced my modifiers in awful, awful ways like this, I bet my penis would be frightened enough to go away, too. In that instance, I couldn't blame it--it would only be following the first body part to jump ship (clearly if I'd made such an egregious word-related screw-up, it's just evidence that, for some reason, my brain was obviously my first body part to go away).

Anyway, now that you've had your Hump Day giggle for the day, head on over to ProgressiveBoink.com if you're in need of something else to amuse you. They write funny stuff, too. They also write baseball-related stuff sometimes. I dig 'em.

Happy Hump Day, everyone!

* Just to clarify, I'm pretty sure this mistake wasn't made by someone at ProgressiveBoink; I'm sure this error came verbatim, directly from the moron who was searching for information.

Looks like these folks offer grammar problems alongside their web solutions...

I love it when I open up my e-mail to find a gem like this waiting for me, just asking to be posted here.

Even funnier than the bits and pieces of Engrish inserted into this e-mail is the fact that the sender is actually wondering why we haven't gotten back to them yet about their "website solution." It's because I'M THE WEBMASTER. We already have a web solution in my department, and that solution is me. And this solution likes having a paycheck (can't buy any more Betsey handbags without it, you know?), so she is not going to suggest to management that she's found a better website solution for the department.

Wait a sec, though... It would be kinda funny if I mentioned to my supervisor that we could have a new "web solution" if we really wanted one. I could take that opportunity to offer up my services as a "spelling solution" or a "grammar solution." Or, even better, a "snark solution." ;)

MISSPELLING MONDAY for July 20, 2009

Not only is this a great submission, but there's a hilarious story to go along with it. Fellow spelling bee queen MarieC sent in this little gem of a picture...



...and here's the explanation behind the picture (which, for the record, should say "Jaycees" instead of "Jaycess"). MarieC says: Here's the picture of my spelling bee trophy. I was one of those geeky spelling bee girls. I was spelling words for fun when I was in kindergarten. Plus, once I learned to spell my maiden name [redacted for privacy purposes--but trust me, it's a toughie!], everything else seemed pretty easy! I was in 6th grade when I won this trophy, and when I pointed it out to the organizers, they were ever-so-mortified. I loved it, and refused their offer of a replacement trophy.

And that, dear readers, is why MarieC is awesome. I think she's in good company when she visits Red Pen, Inc.--don't you? This is the blog all the cool kids read. And by "cool," I mean "awesomely geeky and deliciously snarky." You just can't get cooler than that, can you? :)

FOODIE FRIDAY for July 17, 2009

I can't seem to decide whether this looks absolutely disgusting or totally delicious...

...and I also can't seem to figure out what "a buck of less" is (besides a silly typo, of course). That just sounds funny, doesn't it?

Of course, that little error is nothing, really, compared to this epic fail...



...during which the very same writer tries to convince us to eat the 500-calorie fruit instead of the 100-calorie fruit. (Also confusing: How exactly does the 100-calorie fruit allegedly have 14 more grams of sugar in it than the 500-calorie fruit does? I'm thinkin' they messed that up, too...)

Happy Friday, everyone! :)

Apparently the Misspelling Derby happened after the Home Run Derby ended...

I don't doubt that the folks in St. Louis have a lot of enthusiasm for Pujols, but I'm not so sure the fine folks over at Sports Illustrated's website have a ton of enthusiasm for proofreading. Don't ask me how I came to this conclusion--really, I have no idea whatsoever...

HUMP DAY GRAMMAR for July 15, 2009

This one comes to us from the lovely LadyStyx. She says: Man, you have to love the idiots that write in there. Evidently the woman's man is hovering over the ocean somewhere but that doesn't seem to be her biggest problem. Her biggest problem (quite literally) is that her vagina got lost! Those two items alone are almost humorous enough to make you miss the fact she spelled concerned with an s. She also was hoping for some serious help, yet managed to choose a very sarcastic answer (which has some problems of its own grammatically) as the best of the bunch!

Thank goodness for this winning combination of Yahoo Answers and FAILblog. Those are often the key ingredients for a hilarious Hump Day Grammar post! So many errors and so much stupidity in this picture... *shakes head*

Thanks, LadyStyx, for spotting this one!

Freakin' Yahoos...

A couple days ago, I was having some trouble getting into my e-mail account. So I clicked on the "help" feature on Yahoo to see if it would offer any useful tips in getting me to my inbox faster and without errors.

Yeah, I totally should have known better.

See, I kept getting this error message each time I wanted to read my mail. I could sign in to Yahoo just fine, but I couldn't read any of my mail. After trying to read my mail for 20 minutes, and having 20 minutes' worth of stupid errors showing up whenever I tried...I was frustrated.

I became even more frustrated when I tried to seek help through Yahoo. Above is the form they have that you can use to submit a help ticket. It seemed pretty useless, especially since the form notes the following:

Important notice: Please be sure to check your junk or spam folder if you do not see a reply in your inbox from a Yahoo! Technical Support Agent.

When I saw that, I wanted to scream. This "error 15" was happening because I couldn't get into my inbox. Now, if I can't get into my inbox, how the hell am I supposed to know if a Yahoo! Technical Service Agent had e-mailed me?

But of course those Yahoos couldn't stop there. In addition to that little gem of blatant stupidity, they also had to make a cute little spelling error. They wrote "occassionally" instead of "occasionally."

Ahhh, Yahoo, why does it not surprise me that you put the "ass" in "occasionally" (when it's not supposed to be there at all)? *sigh*

MISSPELLING MONDAY for June 13, 2009

...however, this baseball website's top spelling prospect didn't fare nearly as well, since he made a very silly error in the subheader. (This is something that even his spell-checker should have picked up on!)

Freakin' spelling rookie. *sigh*

FOODIE FRIDAY for July 10, 2009

I was gonna save this one for a Facebook-themed post that I'll be doing in the near-ish future, but you know what? I just couldn't wait. Foodie Friday? No, no, it's Drinky Friday today. And here at Red Pen, Inc., today's special is a lovely concoction of misspelled Guinness, grammatically-challenged vodka, and a splash of snark.

The snarkiness is courtesy of Red Pen, Inc. reader BRIDGETE. The rest of the ingredients come from her friend Christopher. So what do you guys think we should call this crazy drink? I'm thinking "grammartini" sounds pretty appropriate...

Thanks, BRIDGETE, for sending in this hilarious bunch of errors! I hope everyone's Friday is filled with good, strong drinks and lots of snarkiness!

A deadly misspelling!

This is the craziest misspelling I've seen all week. MarieC, who found this one, says, I don't know what a "homocide" is, but it doesn't sound good!

I agree. It sounds, perhaps, like something that's very un-PC... Yikes! (For the record, I am against "homocide," but on days when I'm especially agitated, I might advocate misspellercide.)

Thanks to MarieC for spotting this one. (And don't forget to visit MarieC's blog--she offers a lot of great tips for getting the most value for your money in this crazy economy!)

HUMP DAY GRAMMAR for July 8, 2009

So after last week's Hump Day Grammar post, MAMA GRAMMARPHILE had a special request. She'd noticed that a lot of recent Hump Day Grammar posts were about anal sex. (Which wasn't on purpose, of course--it just kinda happened that way.) So her request was that for the next Hump Day Grammar post--which is today's post--the topic wouldn't be anal sex. Done! (See what a good daughter I am? Mom, aren't you proud? LOL.)

So today we're gonna talk about what happens when you cross an erection with a secretion. You get...drum roll, please...a "secrection"!

But even funnier than a "secrection" is the second half of this Yahoo's question, dealing with becoming "dead afterward." It looks like--from the brief explanation below the question--that she's referring to her husband going limp, but from the "become dead afterward" phrasing, it really sounds like she's banging a vampire who, like, bangs her and then crawls in his little hole to be dead for a while before waking up again at nightfall. (And after reading that sentence, you're thinking, "Has somebody been watching too much True Blood lately?", and I admit--guilty as charged.)

Happy Hump Day, everyone!

These baseball writers have struck out when it comes to spelling things correctly...

In honor of the Phillies' 22-1 win against the Reds last night (which came on the heels of the Phillies sweeping the Mets this past weekend), today's post is a baseball-themed post that doesn't contain any Phillies-related errors. I'll poke fun at bad grammar relating to other teams, for once (not that I ever aim to make fun of Phillies-related bad grammar, but since I read so many Phillies-related things, it just sorta happens that way, you know?).

I was catching up on some Cubs news the other day. The good news was that I discovered that this Micah Hoffpauir dude is pretty cute. The bad news is, whoever wrote this blurb doesn't know how to spell "launched."



Also, what are these things called "strikouts"? I know that, for instance, Cole Hamels had a lot of strikeouts tonight against the Reds (which is reason #1,973,264 why Cole Hamels rocks). But this Nolasco guy on the Marlins only gets strikouts. What gives?


I'm hoping that the Phillies still have some runs left in 'em for the rest of this week and that they didn't blow their run load Monday night. With Florida sneaking up behind the Phillies, they've gotta keep those wins coming in order to stay in first place in the NL East. Let's go, Fightin' Phils!

MISSPELLING MONDAY for July 6, 2009

DANNY C. spotted this error in an MSN article about Sarah Palin's resignation. Danny says: It seems they have not yet learned about spell check. Perhaps they have been embroiled in their own "fued" with Fox News. Ha!

Thanks, DANNY, for spotting this timely error!

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY FROM RED PEN, INC.

Ooh, look...a song lyric FAIL and a patriotism FAIL! C'mon, now, any good American should know that the song goes, "My country, 'tis of thee..."

Thanks to TRACY for spotting this timely error. Happy July 4th, everyone!

FOODIE FRIDAY for July 3, 2009

So there's this restaurant, Johnny Rockets, that I pass on my way to and from movie screenings, which I occasionally attend as part of my job. In my head, I've started calling its employees "the Johnny Rockets Scientists"--sarcastically, of course--for the reasons I'm about to point out. (This place frequently has screwily-written signs in the window, but often I'm in too much of a rush to snap a picture. This time, however, I made the time.)

The first thing I noticed was the spelling error, and I got a good chuckle out of that. But then I saw the phrase "outside patio seating," and I knew that the Department of Redundancy Department must have helped with writing this sign. I mean, really--where the hell else would you put a patio besides outside? Are there indoor patios that I'm not aware of? And do you have to pay for this extra special "outside patio seating"? There's a dollar sign to the left of it...

Happy Friday, everyone. I hope the weather stays nice enough this weekend for you to enjoy a burger on one of those new-fangled outdoor patios... ;)

Please "bee" smarter next time you talk to the press, Mr. Garfinkel...

There's a minor error in this article (it's beekeeper, not bee keeper), but that's nothing compared to the ridiculousness that came outta the mouth of Tom Garfinkel. This article quotes him as saying the following: "If they decide to swarm on a person, whether that's a person, an employer or a fan, we could have a real situation."

Well, see, we do have a real situation. The situation is that the person who said the above sentence was clearly trying to rival Dubya's linguistic magic. Is that second "person" supposed to be "player" instead of "person"? And is that "employer" supposed to be "employee"? In both cases, I bet so... But since that's not what he actually said, I suppose we'll never know.

Also, if he really did mean to say "person" twice, then, in that context, is he implying that employers and/or fans are not people? If they are not people, then who actually qualifies as being a person?

I kinda wish one of those bees would've stung this dude. Can you sting some sense into somebody? It's worth a try...

This one's not grammar-related...

...it's geography-related.

This one came from KEITH. KEITH learned via Facebook that a friend of one of his friends thinks Tokyo is in China. Heh.

I'm just glad this person isn't my friend. And I'm glad that someone called out the friend of KEITH's friend about her geography knowledge...or lack thereof. Brilliant!

HUMP DAY GRAMMAR for July 1, 2009

This probably goes without saying, but if someone's too dumb to know how to properly spell "anal," then he's probably too dumb to be boinking. Because really, would you want some ignorant dude like him to be that close to you? If stupidity's contagious, you'd be fucked. And not in the good way.

Happy Hump Day, you crazy kids!