A fear of baby photos...

I'm sure that at some point, everyone who uses social media has thought,

"For fucks sake! Not another god-damned baby photo!"

At first it was adorable, then it was cute, then it became quaint, and now you'll find that you are either ignored by your friends, or have less friends as a direct result of your obsession with plastering the internet with your childrens achievements.

We know who you are, and in all probability you know who you are as well... You're a serial baby photo poster. The people who think every burp, smile, slurp or shit is worth letting all of your contacts on facebook  know about.  Of course, you're not entirely to blame. When you had your baby, more people than ever before "liked" and commented on your status and photos, lulling you into a sense that your new found popularity was a direct result of your achievement (giving birth) rather than a sense of public or mob obligation to congratulate you. Either way, this early mob reinforcement is in part to blame for the continued barrage of pictures splayed online.

Well, I like so many of my friends who I have talked about this with, hated you...

...that was until I got a puppy.

Don't get me wrong. I still think you're pathetic, but I'm starting to understand you a little better, and perhaps even empathise with your need to post up a new picture or gushing-with-pride status update of your darling little one every second of the waking day.

Getting a puppy has filled me with what I can think are the most basic paternal feelings of pride and love (after all, it's a puppy and not the fruit of my loins), but even so I feel a need to post pictures of them online. I don't - or at least I don't feel like I bombard my immediate online community with canine baby snaps - but now I understand the desire to do so.

In three months of getting two new puppies I have uploaded twelve photos. Excessive? Perhaps, let me know in the comments if I have actually become one of these people. But now that the intial excitement is over (in regards to letting my friends check out my new pups) I don't feel the need to continue showing you my dogs. You know what they look like, and I'm fairly certain you've all seen a dog "sit", "beg", "roll over" and "fetch". And I can safely say with some certainty that there are dogs on YouTube that do it better anyway.

At the end of the day it's a parents right to be proud of their children, and even more so to boast about how gifted your little one is (or probably more realistically, how completely average their development is compared to every other child at that stage of life). I'm not writing this because I want you to stop posting up your nuisance photos or status updates. I, like every other person has the ability to hide/ignore you, or simply to un-friend you should I find you that annoying.

But in the off chance that you think your shit doesn't stink, and consider your posts in the same angelic way as you consider every non-achievement of your child, I am writing this to hopefully enlighten you that there are a large number of people who think your online persona is annoying, and perhaps even offensive or downright depressing (considering those out there who perhaps are struggling to have children that you may not be aware of).

But I suppose the real concern isn't about others who do this, but rather I'm concerned that I will be an offender of serial status updates, baby photos and videos. Perhaps - I have certainly exhibited the initial traits of a serial baby poster, but I've also been able to acknowlegde the fact. Hopefully I've shown enough refexivity that would enable me to realise that my child is just like all other children. Maybe if my child were some kind of savant or prodigy, or incredibly stupid, would I wish to promote or embarras them on the internet, but elsewise I hope that I'm aware enough to not indulge the inner sociopath in me.

I guess I won't really know till I have a child of my own... Until then, all I can do it what I always do.

Ignore. Unfriend. Be happy.

American English...

I would think by now, over my many years of blogging (or not blogging for that matter) that it would have become painfully clear that I have a passion for the English language. I don't feel that there's any point denying it, and am proud to say that I love the English language and the grammar which gives it structure.

I would say that I'm probably an oddity in society as most people are content abusing the language I adore, rather than spending the extra syllable to say a whole word or even using the same number of syllables to say  the same thing with grammatical correctness. While shortening words or pronouncing "th" as "f" is something which I consider physical laziness (rather than mental ineptitude), when a person actually replaces "was" with "were", or other such infractions that don't save time, it is just ignorance and hubris in their challenge of the norm. As with all hubris, it will lead to our downfall.

Although I am given great hope and am very proud at the underground movement to improve the spoken and written word, there comes a point where I feel there is a lack of distinction being made with many of the websites that claim authority over peoples linguistic queries.

Speak American Gawddamnit!

While travelling the world with my then girlfriend, my now wife and I were in the back streets of Venice, lurking and exploring and smelling the wonderful aromas wafting through the narrow doorways of the restaurants at dinner time. When by chance we are stopped in the crowd by an woman who in her brash loud voice asks, "Do you speak American?!" I looked at her, looked at my wife, looked back at her and replied, "No, but I do speak English fairly well."

We all laughed, she at her nativity, us at her ignorance.

Of course I didn't (and don't) blame her for thinking American is a language. American English, even though any difference other than accent would be unrecognisable in the spoken form, does have a different spelling structure to Standard English (what I'll call the form of English used in the UK, Canada & Australia from here on). But the lack of distinction which was displayed by the woman in Venice is now filtering through to the websites that are popping up all over the internet to help instruct people in grammar, spelling and other like queries.

The issue at hand...

Recently I've seen more and more websites come up in my searches when I'm checking something here or there (as I wouldn't consider myself proficient yet), and only after reading through a page of explanation find a line at the bottom stating that in the UK, Australia and Canada they do it differently. At times I wonder if the Americans creating these websites know that the "www" at the beginning of their url means World Wide Web, for I'm certain that they think that only Americans can access their websites, thus avoiding any confusion for those in the rest of the globe using Standard English.

I suppose it's not really an issue, as once I finish reading the waste of time that the websites have offered me I go back to a tried and tested resource to get the relevant information. But something, even a little flag placed on the page to show what the default definition is would be helpful to the billion or so other users looking to improve their English language skills.

Not to say that I have an issue with American English for existing - it attempts to rectify much of what is confusing or illogical in Standard English (although some might say it doesn't go far enough), but rather my gripe is for the confusion it can create for those who aren't sure of their abilities to begin with.

It's these perverse websites that influence our children to stray from the norms of society. Nothing irks me more than correcting a students hand written work for American English spelling mistakes, and I think that this differentiation between grammar and language websites would offer the clarity to those who seek it.