Word Crimes (Weird Al)

[Brian Hitchcock]

Well, the pot calls the kettle black; mote in the other guy's eye, beam in your own; etc.:

The headline of the first of the two articles cited (  http://goo.gl/HRauu2  )  calls Mr. Yankovic's infelicity a "gaff"  (!)
Therein, I posit, lies the greater gaffe. Not a grammar or syntax error, but questionable usage.

But then, the Mail Online is (are?) Australian; maybe it's perfectly OK to confuse the two homophones there. (I can't tell whether it was the Australian Associated Press or the Mail Online who composed the headline.)  There seem to be instances of both spellings for the same meaning in various Australian sites. "The Australian" seems to hedge its bet, recognizing both spellings in the title of its page "Microphone Gaffs | Microphone Gaffes", though the heading text says "Microphone gaffes".

I certainly would not go so far as to use a gaff on Mr. Yankovic, merely because he split an infinitive.

Brian Hitchcock
Technical Writer
Torrance, CA


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