Grammar and such and such

Squirrelmungous is really disappointed that I, quite blasphemously, questioned his grammatical skills in a previous post.

In fact, bad grammar is a bit of a bugbear of his, so let's look at some more of the things that get on his tits... for a change.

For a start, saying 'I will try and do something' is completely nonsensical. You will, in fact, try to do or say or whatever. This is grammatical laziness of the highest order, though unfortunately everyone seems to do it nowadays. Even Alan Bennett, we are ashamed to report, sigh.

You might think Squirrelmungous is being a bit anal here, or is even, dare one say the word, wrong!

But if we think about it for a second we can see that, as always - being omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent and all that - he's got it bang on. Let's look at an example, shall we? Here's a common use of the type of word usage in question:

"I will try and complete that work tomorrow."

In this context 'try' has exactly the same meaning as 'attempt' or 'endeavour'. The speaker is saying, in essence, that he/she will do their best to complete the task, but cannot be sure that they will be succesful. But, if we replace 'try' with either of these two alternatives we can see that the sentence loses its desired meaning;

"I will attempt and complete that work tomorrow."

"I will endeavour and complete that work tomorrow."

If the above sentences mean anything, they are basically saying that the speaker will attempt the task and then complete it, in which case the word 'attempt' or 'endeavour' or 'try' is rendered meaningless, because the task will be completed.

Only by replacing the 'and' with 'to' will the sentence make grammatical sense and the meaning be clear.

Ok' so let's all try and get this right from now on.

FZZZAP

Ow, fuck. Bloody lasers.

Squirrelmungous wants us all to try to get this right from now on and, as an incentive, has permitted me to post a morale boosting image by way of thanks in advance. Admittedly, this is more of a morale booster for his male followers rather than the laydeez, but ho hum.

Our Lord's thoughts on Princess Diana, on the heartbreaking occasion of the 10th anniversary of her death

'Tis 10 years now since the Princess of Hearts, the People's Princess, the Shining Light of Vacuous Non-Entitiness was cruelly torn from our collective bosom. How have we managed to cope without her wisdom, her beauty, her all-pervading wonderfulness in the intervening years?

With the greatest of ease, that's how.

Squirrelmungous was never more ashamed to be associated with 'Great' Britain than he was in September 1997, when it seemed that a large proportion of this nation decided to indulge itself in the most incomprehensible display of mass hysteria and wanton fucking stupidity since god knows when.

Let's do a quick recap on the 'tragic' and 'suspicious' events of that autumn, shall we? This was a relatively attractive, yet none too bright woman who deserved some pity for having to bear Prince Charles two kids (well maybe one... Harry carrot top's a bit of a doubt) who'd let herself go to seed a bit (that swimsuit pic shows her to be a bit fatty, not bloody pregnant) and who had somewhat fallen off the radar.

She hooks up with Dodi - no George Clooney, but minted and clearly an improvement over the jug-eared and mentalist ex, and they're involved in a horrible car crash in Paris and subsequently die. All quite sad, but hey ho, what are you going to do: you get into a big Merc with a pissed up driver and race the paps through Paris and whoops, who put that bloody great concrete post slap bang in the middle of the road...?

Next thing we know, central London is carpeted in flowers and an entire nation appears to have completely lost the fucking plot. Squirrelmungous watched the news with a growing sense of disbelief as thousands of people who had never, ever met this woman and evidently knew fuck all about her wept and wailed about their terrible sense of loss. What exactly did they lose? A few column inches in Hello every week or two? The prospect of more floppy-necked heartwrenching and scandalous interviews with Martin Bashir? A shocking and compelling expose of Royal hatred and hypocrisy in some ghost-written "my side of the story" autobiography? Or perhaps she was just about to single-handedly remove every land mine in Cambodia, cure AIDS and solve world poverty in one fell swoop? Tragically, we'll never know. Although, I'd suggest that the landmine, AIDS and poverty solving bit is a little unlikely.

Three intelligent and well adjusted people ponder the futility of all existence, while at the same time wondering if Will Carling was as good a shag as they'd like to imagine.

Anyhoo, sixty squillion people line the route for her funeral jaunt, having camped on the street for 6,000 years to get a front row spot, her brother (Charles Spencer, what a remarkably wonderful man) spurts out some pointless vitriol and then Dodi's completely hatstand - but outrageously rich - dad says it's all a giant conspiracy and that Prince Philip had his son and Diana murdered. Also, the Royals are actually this lizard race that are plotting world domination, in league with the Isrealis and CarpetRight, and the only way to stop them is to go on and on and on and on about it FOREVER, and to put up a really tasteful statue in Harrods, where everyone should shop, for the sake of world freedom and in tribute to the spirit of Dodi and Diana who were the last great hope of humanity etc. I think that's the gist of it.

So, the French police and the British police investigate and both conclude that the driver was tanked, the car was going too fast and everybody should just give themselves a fucking slap and get on with the rest of their lives.

As if.

Ten years later, and we still have to put up with all of this colossal stupidity.

Squirrelmungous says; ENOUGH. If Diana was alive today, she'd probably be on the X Factor panel instead of Danni - I used to be hot, but now I look faintly frightening - Minogue, so perhaps it's really for the best that she got intimately acquainted with a slab of Parisian concrete on that balmy September evening. Amen.