Thoroughly unnecessary “quotes”

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By Scott MacDonald
October 12, 2007
1:06 PM

Filed under: Quillblog, Advertising, Grammar & punctuation, Miscellany

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Bethany Keeley, a doctoral student at the University of Georgia, has spent the last few years becoming a bit of an expert on wayward quotation marks. Her excellent website, The “Blog” of “Unnecessary” Quotation Marks, features snapshots – taken by her or by one of her many correspondents – of the most flagrant public misuses. Today’s posting, for instance, features a notice from an office worker asking coworkers to put “dirty” dishes in the dishwasher, and telling them that the dishwasher will be “turned on” at 5 p.m.

Other highlights: a restaurant advertising a “hot ham” sandwich; a country fair promoting “fresh” cashews; and a sign welcoming “President” Bush to town.

http://waynejones.ca Wayne Jones

First, in general, thanks for doing this Quillblog and for the entertaining tone of the whole thing — very readable, and informative, too.

Second, would you consider setting up a separate RSS feed for the comments on Quillblog?

The topic of unnecessary quotation marks reminds me of an equally funny/annoying/puzzling practice of Q&Q (the paper version) itself: why is it that you allow your punctuation marks — dash, I remember, and perhaps more — to run outside the regular straignt line of the margins? It looks messy — let’s say, messier than OJ’s “alibis.”
Vigilante

That’s “funny”.

And I agree with “Wayne”.

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