Write your grammar teacher an e-mail.

I never wanted to write on this topic because I was afraid it would make me look snotty. Then I decided that I had actually let the Bush era culture of blissful ignorance and willful stupidity creep into my psyche and prevent me from standing up for grammar. I have had it with facebook messages riddled with "your" instead of "you're" and "their" instead of "there." I have had it with the confusion between fewer and less. (Thank you, Whole Foods and HEB for properly designating express aisles as "12 Items or Fewer".

There is, in fact, a proper use for the beloved and so abused apostrophe. It is (It's) to either create a contraction by taking the place of a letter--or several letters, if you would (you'd) like. The apostrophe also denotes possession. If something is mine, others can say it is Sarah's. Use it wisely, the dear apostrophe. It has done nothing to you. Its and it's have two very different meanings. It's means it is. Its means something belongs to "it". This is not difficult. It just requires thought. A little bit.

I'm not longer going to apologize for being a grammar snob. If I say or write something incorrectly, I hope someone who knows better will correct me. Homonymns are not words taht you can interchange when you are feeling lazy. I'm not arguing that my writing is perfection. As anyone who knows me well enough, and they will tell you I have a terrible time spelling occur. (I always start out writing it with one "c"). Sometimes I screw up the use of affect and effect, but at least I am aware of the problem and take pains to choose the proper word. I had to stare at a USA tagline through all of Ocean's Eleven the other day (the eleven belong to Ocean) that said "More Movies Less Commercials." Commercials are things you can count. It's fewer commercials. If you wanted to say less commercial time, that would be ok. But come on, I know smart people still work in TV because I am friends with a few of them. Let's just try to avoid throwing grammar out the window before the English language becomes too diluted. This is the language of Shakespeare and Dickens and Emerson we're talking about. Their language.