My Lynne Truss moment

Well, I finally did it. I committed a public act of apostrophe correction. I couldn't help myself. I had the means, the opportunity, the motive.

Someone innocently handed me a sign to hold while she went searching for tape at the church picnic. I looked at the sign. In purple foam letters, it said, "KIDS GAMES." Arrrrgh. I spied a purple marker nearby. I could just borrow it for a minute and put it back. No harm would come to anyone. I quickly decided to make my move. I grabbed the marker. No one made a move to stop me. I breathlessly added the apostrophe after "KIDS." Much better. One battle won. It felt good. After all, I'd left the DESERTS sign alone. There was no saving that one. No way to squeeze in another S among the foam letters.

And I had kept quiet about a certain sign at A Local Franchise That Shall Remain Nameless. They had put an apostrophe in the word "WANTS" on a sign. I had to stop myself from physically removing the plastic apostrophe from the sign outside. I guess it was only a matter of time before I acted on my punctuation vigilante impulses.

If anyone doesn't know who Lynne Truss is, I'll gladly explain. She is the hilarious author of the book, "Eats, Shoots and Leaves." The subtitle of the book is "The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation." The title is based on the story about how a misplaced comma can mean the difference between a panda munching on shoots and a panda firing a gun. Lynne writes about her own struggles with the urge to correct punctuation errors. The book jacket has a photo of her with a marker in her hand. She has this mischievous expression on her face as her hand hovers over the place where the apostrophe should be on a poster for the film "Two Weeks Notice." She's a rock star in my book.

Those who think this kind of stuff doesn't matter should consider what could happen if everyone started following their own rules for punctuation. Clarity would suffer, instructions would be misunderstood and anarchy could ensue.

Number people might be a little more sympathetic to the word people's cause if they had to look at incorrect equations on a regular basis. They'd be scratching their heads and saying things like, "Don't they know that doesn't add up?" and, "It's wrong. I just know it is. I wish I had a marker."