The Grammar Vandal

When I walk upstream from my house in the country, there are no billboards to annoy me--with or without grammatical errors.

When I was in Madison in mid-July, I noticed that the metro bus stops around the Capitol Concourse were each decorated with a different theme . One was whitewashed, with the words, “It’s you’re [sic] stop” painted on it. Of the three words, two are commonly misused. The artist got one hard one right, but wasn’t quite up to writing a three-word English sentence correctly. Someone had scratched at the paint and corrected “you’re” to “your” using proofreader’s marks.

The following week, I was listening to Wisconsin Public Radio as is my wont when driving (no, “wont” is not supposed to have an apostrophe since it is the word meaning “habit,” not the contraction). I heard a wonderful interview with the Grammar Vandal. The Vandal is a young woman who takes the step most of us are too timid to take. She perches on ladders, paint brush in hand, to correct the despicable grammar she sees on billboards, ads, signs, and even graffiti. Check the radio web site at http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=5 and look for the July 23, 2007 show titled “Grammar Vandal Goes on Vigilante Comma Crusade” in the archives. The Vandal, Kate McCulley, also blogs. Check her out at http://www.thegrammarvandal.com/