Only one hint: It’s something that you don’t want to get caught doing.
Okay, I’m giving more than one hint, only I’m not telling about the others.
To confirm the answer — only after you’ve figured it out — see the comments for this post.
“I admire Marcia’s clarity and thoroughness. Her examples are excellent in that they illustrate distinctions admirably. She is fun to read.”
— Thomas P. Klammer, coauthor of Analyzing English Grammar, on “You Don’t Know From Prepositions”
The ONLY thing I noticed was that ONLY appears (but ONLY once) in each ad — and in every other sentence as well….
See the URL for this post:
http://marciarieferjohnston.wordpress.com/2011/01/16/the-writer-misplaced-the-only
So it’s ok to use only, but these signs should have put “only” in a different place in the sentence? (I think I can tell where it’s supposed to be in each case).
Elizabeth, You got it.
OK, I confess that I am the only reader who did not catch the misplaced ONLY (onlies?). Thanks to your other alert readers who know a bad ONLY when they see it, I will be more alert for this problem in the future. As that great philospher Ray Orbison would say, “Only the Only…”
I would argue that in most of these examples being colloquial may outrank being grammatically correct. I would be in favor of changing the post office sign and the quality sign, but I don’t think it would be appropriate for the others.
As that great philosopher Roy Orbison also said (and I think this was in one of his other great hits, “Only the lonely”), “You can call me Ray, you can call me Jay, you can call me RJ, you can call me JJ… but you doesn’t have to call me Johnson…”