National Grammar Day: It's Coming

John McIntyre's blog at the Baltimore Sun carried this bit today:

Though this blog is listed as participating in the event, I feel a tremor of apprehension at how the various mavens, snobs, SNOOTs, elitists, prescriptionists and precisionists, drunk with power at getting a day all their own, might comport themselves.

Shall we see people who say “between you and I” clapped into stocks in the public square? Will insurgents sweep through markets, tearing down signs announcing TOMATO’S and CUKE’S? Will newspapers and magazines find themselves buried under sacks of mail full of letters that begin, “Have any of the members of your staff attended college” or “Are any of your employees native speakers of English?” (Read more...)

Mr. McIntyre gives us a great idea: to list the things that will NOT happen on National Grammar Day.

For starters, we will not use stockades. Those aren't terribly portable, and worse--in Restoration London, they were sometimes covered in bits of ears that had once been nailed to the boards.

It would defeat the purpose of the day if participants lost their ears. How would they ever hear correct grammar again?

If you have ideas for other events that will not occur, please send them to info@spogg.org.