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Issue 5
December 2007
We "R" Literal Minded
The Awkward Adverb welcomes reader suggestions, and one reader told us about a pet peeve: the generic store brand Best Yet. While calling a brand the "best yet" doesn't run afoul of any English-language rules, the name indicates a lack of confidence. For the sake of argument, let's concede that the company's butter or canned mushrooms are the best to have ever appeared up to this date in history. The claim then opens consumers' minds to the hope that a superior butter or line of canned mushrooms will appear in the near future.
As this issue of The Awkward Adverb is already examining brand names at face value, we'd like to remind readers how odd the name Babies "R" Us is. Babies "R" Us is an offshoot of Toys "R" Us, and since Toys "R" Us sells toys, logic dictates that Babies "R" Us should sell babies—an unethical and illegal proposition.
Familiarity with the store may also cause people to overlook the tortured syntax of the brand name. Granted, "We Sell Baby Items" would sacrifice memorability and panache for accuracy, but still… "Babies are us"? Not even young children, whom the store is supposedly attempting to mimic, speak this badly. The mess is compounded by the R for are, the misuse of quotes around the R (see here), and the cloying fact that the R is often written backwards. For us sticklers at The Awkward Adverb, it makes us "wanna grow up"—really fast.
About this E-mail
The Awkward Adverb, an e-mail newsletter sent out once a month, highlights English-language flaws that have appeared on a sign, in print, on the Web, or anywhere in the public sphere. It may address grammatical errors, careless usage, bothersome buzzwords, punctuation problems, misspellings, or confusing writing in general.
Subscribers are encouraged to submit their findings for future editions of The Awkward Adverb by responding to this e-mail. Archived past issues of the newsletter are located here.
Henry Alpert, editor of The Awkward Adverb, is a New Orleans-based copywriter and business writer who works with businesses, ad agencies, and graphic design firms on a wide array of writing projects. For more information about his services, visit action-copy.com.
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