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Rex_Rattus
03-02-2010, 22:41
Hi Conrad - you may not be fussed about these sort of things, but just in case you are........

On each pub's page there is a photograph window that invites one to "View all this pubs pictures". This should, of course, read "View all this pub's pictures". You may already be aware of this, but as my search of the forum didn't throw up anything on apostrophes I decided to give it a whirl! In any case, I wouldn't be surprised if it fell in the "too difficult" category.

Rex

ETA
04-02-2010, 07:28
Please, Rex, NO!!!! I'm already getting deja vu. I can't forget a previous forum's threads' children's discussions.

Rex_Rattus
04-02-2010, 08:41
Please, Rex, NO!!!! I'm already getting deja vu. I can't forget a previous forum's threads' children's discussions.

Classic, ETA, classic! It was fun, wasn't it? Honestly, all I'm doing is pointing out an omission to Conrad. It's the end of the matter as far as I'm concerned. I didn't even offer an opinion as to whether he should do anything about it!

Conrad
04-02-2010, 12:24
Hi Conrad - you may not be fussed about these sort of things, but just in case you are........

On each pub's page there is a photograph window that invites one to "View all this pubs pictures". This should, of course, read "View all this pub's pictures". You may already be aware of this, but as my search of the forum didn't throw up anything on apostrophes I decided to give it a whirl! In any case, I wouldn't be surprised if it fell in the "too difficult" category.

Rex
No one expects the:
158

I should have guessed they would be along though :)

Honestly I had no idea, I am terrible with apostrophes (should that have an apostrophe?) and as such tend to just leave them out when in doubt.

No problem with correcting it where people spot it though, so I have been off reading up on them and do agree that the pictures belong to the pub so there should be an apostrophe there, and hopefully now is :)

Thanks for that.

Rex_Rattus
04-02-2010, 15:01
Thanks, Conrad, for the plug for the little known Apostrophe Police. As you would expect, it is staffed by a hard working band of dedicated pubic servants. It is obviously a publicly funded QANGO equipped with much needed swingeing powers of search and arrest - headed up I believe by retired Chief Constable Sir Mustapha Colon, who is clearly cheap at the price on his miserly salary of £750K per annum. However, I was disappointed that in the tagline to its logo "Its a matter of principle", they have failed to spell the first word correctly as "it's". Looks like a "Caeser's wife" scenario.You can rest assured that I shall be raising this issue when I next see Sir Mustapha at our golf club!

OK ETA, I'm finished now. No need to give me another rollicking! Just trying to inject an element of humour into an otherwise fairly dull subject!

hopwas
04-02-2010, 15:17
This thread bought me to this.. http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/510437-birmingham-bans-apostrophes-from-road-signs

It caused uproar and was on local nespapers headlines.

Personally I am not bothered with Apostrophe and I really don't care about what's wrong or right..

Hoppy

Conrad
04-02-2010, 15:26
It's a funny old one I hate text speak and am normally a stickler for trying to get my writing as correct as possible, but when it comes to apostrophes I just cannot be bothered - apart from where they are used for contractions, I think they will just slowly disappear. I have no problem with getting things right though, when it is wrong it will niggle some people, whereas it will probably niggle no one if you get it right.

Also loving the humour in this thread though.

Rex_Rattus
04-02-2010, 16:23
Thanks for that Hoppy. I'm pretty sure that I had heard about this before, but it might have been somewhere other than Birmingham.

Where I think the existence or not of apostrophes is relevant is in pub names. Is it The Kings Head or the The King's Head? In my view the proper name of the pub should be decided by what it says on the pub sign - if you look above the pub and it says "The Kings Head" then it is The Kings Head - if it says "The King's Head" then it's The King's Head. This becomes relevant when using a search feature. When searching for a pub in Another Place it made a difference whether or not you inserted an apostrophe. I tended to ignore apostrophes because the search feature tended to produce results more often that way.

So, maybe there is a case for standardisation. But for goodness sake don't tell any of my chums from the Apostrophe Police that I said that, or I'll never get another invite to their Christmas party at the Apostrophile's Arms!

Conrad
04-02-2010, 16:37
Just did a quick check of our search, it needs a little more tuning by me at some point, I'll make a note of it to look at. For the moment though it will match {King's} if you miss the apostrophe, but if you add it it will not match {Kings}. It should work either way really.

Damn another bug to add to my list :)

hopwas
04-02-2010, 16:47
Sorry Conrad.. Seems I am buggering you all day so apologise!

Er.. I noticed you have King's Heath, Brum and King's Norton, Brum in your pub listings. It is common mistake and they never had apostrophe in their names. If you dont believe me.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kings_Heath and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kings_Norton..

This will be my last post in this thread, I promise!

Hoppy

Conrad
04-02-2010, 16:53
Sorry Conrad.. Seems I am buggering you all day so apologise!

This is just a foul rumour and I am firmly sat down ON MY SEAT. :o

Sorry Hoppy, I couldn't resist.

Conrad
04-02-2010, 17:31
Er.. I noticed you have King's Heath, Brum and King's Norton, Brum in your pub listings. It is common mistake and they never had apostrophe in their names. If you dont believe me.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kings_Heath and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kings_Norton..
Just spent a while looking into this, I think we actually have it correct.

Is this where you type Kings Heath or Kings Norton into our search and it comes back under the Google results? If so those are nothing to do with us, just us passing on results from a Google search, so you will have to take it up with a higher power :)

oldboots
04-02-2010, 18:00
Er.. I noticed you have King's Heath, Brum and King's Norton, Brum in your pub listings. It is common mistake and they never had apostrophe in their names. If you dont believe me.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kings_Heath and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kings_Norton..



Just spent a while looking into this, I think we actually have it correct.
so you will have to take it up with a higher power :)

I don't know if they're a higher power but the Ordnance Survey prints King's Heath, King's Norton, Acock's Green on its maps. Bromsgrove isn't Brom's Grove though :D

I don't have much trouble with apostrophes, either missing or of the greengrocer's type but I get very confused when people don't understand the difference between there, their and they're.

Conrad
04-02-2010, 23:18
Ohhhhh, so who is the greater authority wikipedia or Ordnance Survey. The joys that apostrophes bring.

I know what you mean about there, their and they're. When they are done wrongly it always causes my brain to stall.

hopwas
05-02-2010, 07:32
Ohhhhh, so who is the greater authority wikipedia or Ordnance Survey. The joys that apostrophes bring.

I know what you mean about there, their and they're. When they are done wrongly it always causes my brain to stall.

Surely Birmingham City Council has higher authority than OS.

I'll leave you do the thinking...

oldboots
05-02-2010, 10:15
Surely Birmingham City Council has higher authority than OS.

I'll leave you do the thinking...

don't get me started on town hall jobsworths for gods* sake, all I know is it certainly ain't :muppet:Wikipedia:muppet:




* should it or shouldn't it have one?:p

trainman
05-02-2010, 10:43
Well, I, too, get (un)duly wound up about apostrophe mis-use & am somewhat surprised Maldenman hasn't been along to name me as one of Sir Mustapha's unpaid cohorts. The thread though, has thrown up a couple of questions:


it is staffed by a hard working band of dedicated pubic servants!

Are you sure about that Rex?


"Its a matter of principle"

Superb!



don't tell any of my chums from the Apostrophe Police that I said that, or I'll never get another invite to their Christmas party at the Apostrophile's Arms!

or is it Apostrophiles' Arms? Hmm, I suppose if the arms belong to the innkeeper, rather than his customers, then you'd be correct Rex.


Sorry Conrad.. Seems I am buggering you all day


Conrad beat everyone to a response, but it would be churlish to to 'bump' the issue...



* should it or shouldn't it have one?:p

Yep, but not where that asterisk is!

Rex_Rattus
05-02-2010, 11:23
Thanks for your input Trainman. When I mentioned to Maldenman in the pub the other night that I was thinking of starting this thread (or more accurately alerting Conrad to the absent apostrophe - I didn't know it was going to run to a thread) he did speculate that you might well feel obliged to have a say!

"hard working band of dedicated public servants" No, not sure about that one; could be an oxymoron I suppose.

"Apostrophile's Arms" Of course it could be The Apostrophiles' Arms - as you know it depends on how many apostrophiles own the pub. But as it's my pub, then it's for me to say that it is singular in this case!

"gods*". Another very good question.The apostrophe should certainly be before the "s" if oldboots is appealing to the Christian God, but it could correctly be after the "s" if he is appealing to the Hindu, Greek, Roman or Norse Gods. In any case it should be capitalised. I'm so glad you raised that one!

Conrad
05-02-2010, 12:38
"gods*". Another very good question.The apostrophe should certainly be before the "s" if oldboots is appealing to the Christian God, but it could correctly be after the "s" if he is appealing to the Hindu, Greek, Roman or Norse Gods. In any case it should be capitalised. I'm so glad you raised that one!
Is that right? :)

Rex_Rattus
05-02-2010, 13:18
Is that right? :)

In grammatical terms, it would be correct for the apostrophe to be after the "s" (as in for Gods' sake) if he is appealing to more than one God - as in "Norse Gods". I'm right there, aren't I Trainman? There were (or are - I don't want to appear Norseist!!) quite a lot of them! Or do you mean that it might not be correct to capitalise "Norse Gods"? I would have thought that it was correct, but I am not an expert on these sort of semi religious matters. There's probably someone, somewhere, who thinks I'm committing heresy just by referring to Odin, Thor, Loki, etc, etc as Gods! I really don't want to bring the Norse Police down on our heads, do I, Conrad?!

oldboots
05-02-2010, 15:01
"gods*". Another very good question.The apostrophe should certainly be before the "s" if oldboots is appealing to the Christian God, but it could correctly be after the "s" if he is appealing to the Hindu, Greek, Roman or Norse Gods. In any case it should be capitalised. I'm so glad you raised that one!

you have seen my dilemma, a singular God or plural Gods, there's also the Christian idea of the Trinity to consider here :p


What about.... should it be "God" or "god" if one is atheist?


Actually I'll stick with Terry Pratchett on the God(s) question, bring back Pervs Galore.

Conrad
05-02-2010, 15:04
I meant should you put an apostrophe after your referral to the Norse Gods, but I think you answered it, you weren't appealing to them, merely referring to them.

Desperately trying to think what what be analogous to the Norse police in their mythology, the furies were Greek weren't they? I suppose arguably the Valkyries were Nordic Police, in which case you may feel free to bring as many as you like down on our heads ;)

All this talk of pantheons has reminded me how much I am looking forward to the rerelease of Clash of the Titans later this year:
Trailer link (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6CJenNMsb4)

Rex_Rattus
05-02-2010, 19:06
you have seen my dilemma, a singular God or plural Gods, there's also the Christian idea of the Trinity to consider here :p


What about.... should it be "God" or "god" if one is atheist?




Phew! I see the problem. Where's "an_ecumenical_matter" when you need him!?

Maldenman
05-02-2010, 21:35
AAAAARRGGGHHHH!!!!!.......(sorry too many !'s) Just stop it now you two!

Rex_Rattus
05-02-2010, 21:39
AAAAARRGGGHHHH!!!!!.......(sorry too many !'s) Just stop it now you two!

Sorry mate, you're about a day too late with that advice!

Maldenman
05-02-2010, 21:42
On my way round with the medication. Breathe and calm.

(Rex see text re Tuesday)

Conrad
07-02-2010, 01:48
Much as I should let this thread die, it seemed like the sensible place to mention that apostrophes are now ignored by the pub search on the main site.

I was bored and it was on my list of things to sort.

Millay
07-02-2010, 09:27
I’d missed this thread, what fun it looks.

On the whole King’s Head / Kings Head issue I have always believed that the latter is more appropriate. The reasoning behind this is that the thing being described is not a head belonging to a King but an entirely different thing, a pub. Another, and perhaps better, example would be the Queens Arms. Many pubs have Arms in their title but feel no need to either pluralise what comes before it or add an apostrophe if it is plural.

An exception to this would probably be more prevalent in Ireland where pubs are often named after the owners, Paddy’s Bar for example. In that instance the thing being described is actually a bar belonging to Paddy so I believe the apostrophe is appropriate.

There are no grammatical rules that I know of to prove the above points, they are just the result of a logical and, for the moment anyway, sober mind :)

Edit - I suppose if a Mr King had a number of pubs his best one might be called the King’s Head Pub :D

Rex_Rattus
07-02-2010, 11:27
Another, and perhaps better, example would be the Queens Arms. Many pubs have Arms in their title but feel no need to either pluralise what comes before it or add an apostrophe if it is plural.



:D

I'm afraid that went right over this "King's" Head!

Conrad - thanks for the advice regrading apostrophes when searching; just leave them out is the simplest way forward.

trainman
07-02-2010, 20:29
I’d missed this thread, what fun it looks.
The reasoning behind this is that the thing being described is not a head belonging to a King but an entirely different thing, a pub.

I have to disagree there Millay (I think!) - the pub is called the King's Head by association and the pub sign will almost certainly depict that very thing - a head belonging to a king.

Oggwyn Trench
07-02-2010, 20:43
I meant should you put an apostrophe after your referral to the Norse Gods, but I think you answered it, you weren't appealing to them, merely referring to them.

Desperately trying to think what what be analogous to the Norse police in their mythology, the furies were Greek weren't they? I suppose arguably the Valkyries were Nordic Police, in which case you may feel free to bring as many as you like down on our heads ;)

All this talk of pantheons has reminded me how much I am looking forward to the rerelease of Clash of the Titans later this year:
Trailer link (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6CJenNMsb4)

You have done it now , last time Valkyries were mentioned on a beer forum Arkwrite googled them and needed the nurse and tablets for a month

trainman
07-02-2010, 20:51
a hard working band of dedicated pubic servants.



"hard working band of dedicated public servants" No, not sure about that one; could be an oxymoron I suppose.


Re-read original quote - it wasn't the potential oxymoron which I was querying when I asked "Are you sure about that?" ...


I think that if the gods were plural, one might expect an identifier - so, for the sake of God (singular) "for God's sake", and for the sake of the Gods (plural) "for the Gods' sake"

trainman
07-02-2010, 20:58
AAAAARRGGGHHHH!!!!!....

Maybe, but it's better than entertaining any football thread after this weekend...

Rex_Rattus
07-02-2010, 22:41
Re-read original quote - it wasn't the potential oxymoron which I was querying when I asked "Are you sure about that?" ...


I think that if the gods were plural, one might expect an identifier - so, for the sake of God (singular) "for God's sake", and for the sake of the Gods (plural) "for the Gods' sake"

OK, fair enough. Mea culpa - my typing's worse than my spelling!

I suppose it should be "for the Gods' sake" if one is referring to specific Gods, which would almost certainly be the case of course. Theoretically one could be referring to an indeterminate number of unspecified Gods, but that seems unlikely.

Conrad
07-02-2010, 22:45
I suppose it should be "for the Gods' sake" if one is referring to specific Gods, which would almost certainly be the case of course. Theoretically one could be referring to an indeterminate number of unspecified Gods, but that seems unlikely.
I'm agnostic, so it works for me.

trainman
31-05-2011, 08:41
Well, we've not been here for a while!
Passing this place (http://www.pubsgalore.co.uk/pubpictures/65889/), yesterday, had me making a mental note to dig up this thread to ask why, why, why?

ETA
31-05-2011, 11:35
Well, we've not been here for a while!
Passing this place (http://www.pubsgalore.co.uk/pubpictures/65889/), yesterday, had me making a mental note to dig up this thread to ask why, why, why?

It's wrong on so many levels (but so is farting in a lift...)

NickDavies
31-05-2011, 13:55
Well, we've not been here for a while!
Passing this place (http://www.pubsgalore.co.uk/pubpictures/65889/), yesterday, had me making a mental note to dig up this thread to ask why, why, why?

It belongs to Mr The Two Half, nice chap. However don't say 'It's a game of two halves" when he plays chess with his brother, he's heard it all before.