Grammar Moses: Legislating good grammar? It may come to that

Regular reader John McGovern of Gilberts stopped me at the gym the other day to tell me about a piece of correspondence he received at work.

“Someone wrote, ‘This is holey inappropriate.”

“Yeah?” I replied, knowing there would be a punchline.

“H-O-L-E-Y,” he said.

The word, I assume most of you know, should have been “wholly,” meaning “completely.”

Wearing ripped jeans to a black-tie affair might be considered “holey inappropriate,” I suppose.

And if you went to the theater to see “Spotlight,” you'd know the meaning of “holy inappropriate.”

We hereby resolve ...

A grammar-conscious state representative in Missouri named Stacy McCreery finally had enough. So last month she sponsored a House resolution that reads:

WHEREAS, on occasion, members of the Missouri House of Representatives have used the word ‘physical' instead of ‘fiscal' when referring to fiscal matters including, but not limited to, fiscal review and fiscal notes; and

WHEREAS, the use of proper terminology is important to our legislative process:

NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that we the members of the Missouri House of Representatives, Ninety-eighth General Assembly, hereby urge the members of the Missouri House of Representatives to use the word ‘fiscal' instead of ‘physical' when referring to fiscal matters.”

I can see where describing Missouri's fiscal shortcomings could be misinterpreted as its physical shortcomings.

A hearing has not yet been scheduled on the resolution, but I would hope the good people of the Show Me State legislature wouldn't turn this into a squabble that results in a budget not being passed. Come to think of it, maybe I'll form the Grammar Party in Illinois with my lone campaign plank being to clean up the books.

Mea culpa

In last week's column I wrote about the problem with false ranges. An example I used was “soup to nuts.”

My exposure to the idiom was restricted to misuse by a grandparent and the name of a catchall store and a food store, where it was used as a pun.

“Soup to nuts,” as a couple eagle-eyed readers pointed out, is a legitimate range because it relates to the meal beginning with soup and ending with nuts. One reason this was unfamiliar to me is that my wife would never serve nuts for dessert — unless they were in a cake or cookies.

Write carefully!

• Jim Baumann is assistant vice president/managing editor of the Daily Herald. Write him at jbaumann@dailyherald.com. Put Grammar Moses in the subject line. You also can friend or follow Jim at facebook.com/baumannjim.