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do you, fair reader, understand the role of capitalization? because i don’t. i’ve done an extensive amount of research, and in the ones of articles that i have read, there is not a single mention of why capitalization came about. i would be willing to wager sum of upwards of $25 that some asshole named frederick capital thought it would be pretty fucking sweet if he made some letters bigger than others, and call it capital-ization. this dick single-handedly made 98% of elementary school students fail the handwriting quiz because they couldn’t write a cursive capital q (it looks like a 2—real imaginative frederick). prick.
apparently, according to mr. capital, some words are just more important than others. let’s take the following story for example:
“Miles Davis, the Indians, and a Jew went to the local Kleenex factory to see how God and Mr. Franco were doing. While they were there, they encountered some members of the Ku Klux Klan and NAFTA speaking Spanish together. It turned out that when the Klan members took off their hoods, they were actually New York Mets. The Mets and Miles Davis decided to have Thanksgiving on September 23rd, which was a Thursday. They got on the Internet and booked flights to Plymouth Rock, Massachusetts so they could see the Atlantic Ocean. God and the Native Americans got pissed about this so they decided to play a trick on Miles Davis and the Mets. They got some Crisco and greased up the wheels of the American Airlines airplane. When the plane landed, it was too slippery and crashed into a forest of Red Pines and Peregrine Falcons—Miles Davis and the New York Mets did not get to the Promised Land.” (disclaimer – this paragraph does not reflect the views or opinions of matt shirley the writer—i don’t really think the mets are members of the kkk—nor does it mean anything whatsoever..
now i don’t think that the ku klux klan is that cool, so why should it be capitalized? and the new york mets are probably even worse, yet they stand above other words. the word “scrotum” is pretty cool, and yet it is stuck in the inferior text. crisco and kleenex are alright but should my microsoft word program really be correcting me right now—trying to capitalize these words like they are on the same level as god and frankie muniz? our capitalization rules have gotten out of control and what is the point anyway? all of the other conventions and mechanics i can understand, but capitalization makes about as much sense as giving ray charles a digital camera for christmas:
ray: who’s this one from? wife: that’s from cousin melvin. ray opens the gift ray: what is it honey? wife: it’s a digital camera ray melvin: do you like it ray? ray: yeah its great! now i can go on that photo safari i was dreaming about. oh, but… damn. i just remembered: i am not currently blessed with the gift of sight. thanks for reminding me though. dickhead.
anyway, like I was saying, all of the other english mechanics make sense. let me explain:
the colon
not only is the colon great at extracting water from feces and producing stool samples on command (physiology humor), it is also very adept at letting the reader know that what follows it, clarifies what precedes it.
sentence with a colon: “the theory proves two things: that george bush sucks and our country is being run by incompetent retards.”
same sentence without: “the theory proves two things that george bush sucks and our country is being run by incompetent retards.”
the second sentence makes it sound like the topic of the sentence is exactly what george bush sucks, and the part about the country being mismanaged is an afterthought. but we aren’t sure exactly what these sucked things are. are they kittens? are they grapes? who knows.
(oh and without colon, who would supply the eyes for the smiley faces? :) )
the comma
by far my favorite piece of punctuation. the comma is great because he provides for some dramatic pauses. his presence is able to change the entire meaning of the sentence. for example, i was recently playing some online poker and a player was taking forever to act on his hand. instead of typing “let’s go, jerkoff” – implying that i would like him to engage a decision in a timely manner, i write “let’s go jerkoff” which makes it sound like i want to share an intimate moment of self-gratification with this guy. fortunately my peers were too stupid to pick up the nuances of the language and i was spared the feeling of everyone else thinking that i wanted to play a game of ookie cookie or soggy biscuit.
the exclamation point
i really don’t like exclamation point that much. he is overused and tends to be taken advantage of by sorority girls who love to punctuate every sentence with his lanky ass. for this reason, i tend to try to compensate and use him with extreme frugality. but i do recognize that he does serve a function—there are just some sentences that have to be exclaimed. for example:
“dude, your son just stapled my balls to the coffee table!”
this sentence really personifies the urgency of the situation. the guy just got his balls stapled to the coffee table and he would really like some assistance in getting the staple out of his scrotum.
“dude, your son just stapled my balls to the coffee table.”
this sentence conveys a feeling of satisfaction—the guy is happy that his anatomy is fastened to the furniture by a piece of u-shaped metal and shows no real urgency to remedy the situation. this is fine, but it doesn’t capture the essence of a realistic scenario. no un-stoned man is going to be fine with this state of affairs. exclamation point lets us find this urgency and allows us to express it to the highest degree.
the period
the final convention that i would like to examine is the period (notice no physiology jokes this time). without the period, there would be absolutely no rhyme or reason to any paragraph or work of writing. it would be total chaos—like trying to find a nickel taped to a 10-armed, spanking machine. the period is really the glue that holds together the entire english language. he tells everyone else where to be and exactly what to wear.
this brings us back to capitalization. i have written this entire article without capitalizing a single word (except for the part about the mets and the kkk) and i don’t think that you had a bit of trouble reading it. this proves that unlike his punctuation brothers, capitalization is utterly useless and if we all band together we can have an equal opportunity language—where all letters are treated fairly and all words carry the same weight. we can be exactly like rosa parks (and i mean exactly)—don’t settle for the back of the language bus.
This is what we've been reduced to? Grammar humor? What's next? "The 50 Adverbs That Need a Vicious Beating"? "Seriously, Get This Semicolon Out of My Sentence"? Telling people they can go pound ampersand? I usually try to stay positive w/ my comments, but this article was boring and not funny.
Victor French
Fucked up.
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Posted: 5/10/2006 8:52:48 AM
Had a crazy dream last night. Dreamed I was riding an Oakland A's surfboard through the waves of Jonathan's angelic mullet. The surfboard, of course, smelled like a hunk of shit. In one hand, I was holding a large pizza. Pepperoni and lugnuts. In the other I held what looked like 14 used brillo pads. They too reeked of unspeakable shit. I continued to ride until I emptied out onto a highway. The long stretch of asphalt was littered with fuckin' brat kids, wheelchair jockeys, and whiny old people.
JPM
Victor French
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Posted: 5/10/2006 8:57:46 AM
I had a dream last night that you were wiped off the face of the earth by a man eating billy goat.
Too bad it was only a dream.
No Ford shitbox today?
Mr. Mr.
Not too good.
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Posted: 5/10/2006 9:16:43 AM
The article ran a little too long for me. Kind of boring. I must admit that Victor's comment had me rolling.
Bruce
French.
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Posted: 5/10/2006 9:22:27 AM
Did the 14 used brillo pads symbolize your musty beard? Funny shit.
Instigator
What about
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Posted: 5/10/2006 9:32:07 AM
the hyphen?
Bob
French
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Posted: 5/10/2006 9:38:24 AM
I must say at first I was a little annoyed by his comments, but lately his comments have been better than the actual articles.
Vote French!
JPM
Instigator
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Posted: 5/10/2006 9:40:49 AM
What about...your a homo?
JPM
Spelling Mistake
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Posted: 5/10/2006 9:58:09 AM
Sorry, you're a homo.
JPM
No Breast Feeding Babies
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Posted: 5/10/2006 10:05:17 AM
Up this early. Looks like Mommy hasn't come home from her weekly chest waxing to wake them up yet.
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