I admit it I am an unabashed correct spelling snob. I am not proud of this since there are not any good things in being termed a snob. Obviously when people write they should use the correct spelling of a word. Spell check is ubiquitous. Context checking, sadly, is not by the way.

It’s almost as if my eyes scan a document on a never ending search for a misspelled word. I am not thinking this constantly but find myself often shaking my head at how badly people spell. Yet today I received an email back from someone with whom I have rare correspondence and while I noticed a misspelled word in the reply what horrified me more was my own error. And it was not even a spelling error. I wrote “I so deeply sorry”…instead of “I am so deeply sorry”. While that’s not a misspelling and I have been diligently studying Mandarin for 17 months, it is not my intention to speak (or write) broken English.

There are some errors that are regular which are not spelling mistakes – like the use of “their” instead of “there” (or even they’re) which are spelled correctly but misused. I am sure it will be easy to come up with a number of most misspelled/misused words.

What we all know is that people make mistakes. Often those can be simple typing mistakes that may not appear as such. Habitual bad spelling is one thing but turning one’s nose up at a spelling error or two is just bad form. Everyone I know is working longer and harder than ever before and (me included) in our collective haste – we occasionally make mistakes.

So the next time you shake your head at what looks like a dumb spelling mistake think about cutting the person some slack. I am going to try to do the same (but old habits die hard).

In the meantime if you have any shining examples of improperly spelled words please do share – we could all use a laugh or two.