The fearsome Alot, tamed by a grammatically conscientious person

I read a cartoon essay with my 10 year old and he promised me that forevermore he will be unconfused about when to use alot and when to use a lot.

Hyperbole and a Half: The Alot is Better Than You at Everything

Alot of Laughter

We laughed a lot reading this and when I commented on that he challenged me to draw alot of laughter. Here it is.

Originally I drew him with many laughing mouths but I had to take them out as he started looking like a manic Corinthian. And, yes, he has some vaguely basset-hound traits and that is to be blamed on Eric, our new foster pup.

Hat tip to The Oatmeal for tipping me off to the Alot.

Google grammar tricks

I recently read an article and saw a delightful gem of a comment thread between two responders.

"@Commenter: " . . . miss a typo after pouring over a document . . . " I'm not sure if your use of 'pouring' here is an intentional demonstration of the point, or not - but note that it should be 'poring' instead. "

Image by the_munificent_sasquatch via Flickr

I think having good grammar and writing well is a really essential skill, but sometimes the nuances of a language can be tricky to master. (Especially for non-native speakers; you have my sympathy.) This example above is a good case in point: which is right? Poring over, or pouring over?

One simple way to check is to use google. Open a search, and type "pouring over" and note how many results you get - today for me was 398,000. Then type "poring over" and compare the results - 624,000. (Mind those quotes, they're important for search.) Based on these numbers, I can see that "poring over" is correct.


Not everything is amenable to a simple popularity contest. Check out a book or two for a more thorough understanding of grammar. I think grammar generally is adequately judged by common usage, because grammar arises from conventions. But be warned: acting as the grammar enforcer at work or around your friends won't win any popularity contests. Another good resource to check and see if an expression you're using in writing is a problem is Wikipedia's page on common misspellings/grammar and Misc.