Misinformation spreads like bedbugs. For centuries, humans have clung to articles of faith gleaned from parents and grandparents, brothers and sisters, authority figures, community leaders, and other notoriously unreliable sources.<\/p>\n
These rumors, superstitions, misinterpretations, urban legends, and baseless theories are often nothing more than quaint, harmless nonsense. Then again, try telling that to those who believe them.<\/p>\n
The pop culture, fueled by blogs, YouTube, and Twitter, should never be confused with anything serious or responsible. So just for the fun of it, see if you\u2019re wise to these pop-culture fallacies.<\/p>\n
Jack Daniels<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0This is neither the man nor the booze. The man\u2019s name was Jack Daniel<\/em>, whose Jack Daniel Distillery was licensed in 1866. Thus, his fine Tennessee whiskey is Jack Daniel\u2019s<\/em>, with an apostrophe.<\/p>\n Louis Armstrong<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0Jazz aficionados are not amused when they hear his first name pronounced \u201cloo-ee.\u201d In his vocal on the 1964 hit song \u201cHello, Dolly!\u201d Armstrong pointedly articulates \u201cloo-iss\u201d when he says, \u201cThis is Louis, Dolly.\u201d<\/p>\n St. Patty\u2019s Day<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0Everyone knows this refers to March 17, St. Patrick\u2019s Day\u2014or does it? How you celebrate it is your business, but how you spell it is St. Paddy\u2019s<\/em> Day.<\/p>\n Santa\u2019s reindeer<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0Good for you if you can name them all, but let\u2019s just talk about \u201cDonner\u201d (of \u201cDonner and Blitzen\u201d fame). Turns out Donner is an infamous pass in the northern Sierra Nevada. Santa\u2019s reindeer is Donder, with a second d<\/em>.<\/p>\n Daylight Savings Time<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0Few would think twice about the phrase as written here, but it\u2019s supposed to be \u201cdaylight saving<\/em> time\u201d\u2014no capitals, no second s<\/em> in \u201csaving.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m laughing all the way to the bank\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0This defiant proclamation has become a clich\u00e9. It implies that the speaker is so rich that nothing bothers him. It misquotes a celebrated pianist named Liberace, whose flamboyance some considered bad form in the strait-laced 1950s. After one scathing review, Liberace wrote a letter to the critic, wryly informing him, \u201cI cried all the way to the bank.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cTake Me Out to the Ballgame\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0Everyone sings baseball\u2019s anthem wrong. The second line, which everyone thinks is, \u201cTake me out to the crowd,\u201d is really \u201cTake me out with<\/em> the crowd.\u201d The fifth line, which everyone thinks is, \u201cFor it\u2019s root, root, root for the home team,\u201d is actually, \u201cLet me <\/em>root, root, root for the home team.\u201d<\/p>\n Let\u2019s give the last word on this to former major-leaguer Larry Anderson, who pitched for a few teams in the 1970s: \u201cIn the seventh inning, fans all get up and sing \u2018Take Me Out to the Ball Game\u2019\u2014and they\u2019re already there.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Misinformation spreads like bedbugs. For centuries, humans have clung to articles of faith gleaned from parents and grandparents, brothers and sisters, authority figures, community leaders, and other notoriously unreliable sources. These rumors, superstitions, misinterpretations, urban legends, and baseless theories are often nothing more than quaint, harmless nonsense. Then again, try telling that to those who […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,21,25,53,34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-apostrophes","category-capitalization","category-humor","category-idioms","category-possessives"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2315"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2315"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2315\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}