When I was a kid, we walked to school through three feet of snow, uphill both ways; all we had to play with was a stick and a pile of dirt, and we were grateful; and there was this crazy part of speech known as the adverb.
One nice thing about working at a publisher is that I get to be around other people who care about the difference between there, their, and they're. One of my colleagues was lamenting the disappearance of the adverb this week. And I've already done my own lamenting about shifting trends in subject-verb agreement when it comes to singular nouns that denote groups. And as much as I believe in following conventions for the sake of clear and effective communication, and as much as it pains me to say it, I think this is just how language evolves. It's interesting to think that language can change significantly within one generation. By the time my peers and I are in our eighties, will usage that's considered incorrect now be acceptable and even taught in schools? Perhaps I shouldn't protest so much and just accept the inevitable.
Like being trapped in the tundra and finding a place by a rock where I can sit and let cold, numbing death slowly overwhelm me.
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