You Don’t Say

I was driving down Ventura Blvd. in Studio City, California, the other day when I saw this sign in the window of a hair salon:

Walk-in’s Welcome

Hmm. What’s that apostrophe doing there? Shouldn’t the sign read Walk-ins Welcome? I think so, if the message is that people without appointments are welcome. Of course, if the sign was meant to announce a welcome for a walk-in customer, then it’s fine as it is. My guess? Whoever approved the sign had spent too much time under the hair dryer.

What this sign needs is a plural noun—walk-ins. The message is that walk-ins are welcome at this salon. But the apostrophe turns the plural noun into the possessive form. Except in a couple of very specific situations (see #4 and #5 below), the apostrophe is not used to form the plural of a noun.

So for the folks at the salon and anyone else who needs it, here’s a quick review of the uses of the apostrophe:

1. To show possession

·       Greta’s Salon

·       the prince’s palace

2. In contractions to show that letters are missing

·       I’ve (I have)

·       haven’t (have not)

3. In dates to show the century number has been eliminated

·       ’80s disco music

·       the Spirit of ’76

4. To make the plural of certain forms of letters, abbreviations, and figures

·       dot your i’s and cross your t’s

·       Ph.D.’s

·       1990’s (or 1990s)

5. To avoid confusion

·       too many which’s and that’s

Let’s hope the folks at that Studio

Billionaire Eli Broad (as in road) and his wife, Edythe, are among the richest and most philanthropic couples in America. In September 2007 they gave $20 million to the Center of Regenerative and Stem Cell Research at UCLA.  Mazel tov—they’re doing their part for medical research. Of course, he’ll get a building named after him for that little gesture.

With multi-million dollar donations come, naturally, press interviews. When Mr. Broad was interviewed on one of LA’s public radio stations about the donation and what it said about him, he responded, “What it says about Edie and I is we’re interested in giving back and improving the human condition.” 

About Edie and I?? The subject pronoun I used as the object of the preposition about? What he should have said was “What it says about Edie and me….”  Sorry, Mr. Broad, no English department chairs named after you this month.

We peons can take some comfort in Mr. Broad’s grammar slip-up—even billionaires screw up the English language.

At Bed, Bath & Beyond the other day, Tony, a, friendly, young clerk, rang up my purchases. He handed me the receipt, and I said “Thank you.” To which he replied, “No problem.”

That response still throws me, because I’m expecting to hear “You’re welcome.” But no problem, like awesome and dude, is part of the jargon, the patois, of a generation. Not my generation, as you may have guessed.

Nevertheless, I have a problem with no problem replacing you’re welcome.

In the first place, any reasonable request I make as a paying customer (not a guest, but that will be the subject of another posting) in a store or restaurant should not be perceived as a problem. That’s what Tony et al are getting paid for—to provide service and respond to my requests. So my thank you when services are rendered is a way of acknowledging that my request has been met and the job has been done properly or adequately. Nothing more, nothing less. Seems to me that the appropriate response is you’re welcome, not no problem.

Much like don’t mention it, no problem suggests that someone has performed a favor above and beyond the call of duty. Bringing a cocktail to the table or ringing up a simple transaction hardly qualifies.

Language is dynamic and reflects a society’s changing attitudes and values. In today’s society, in which flip-flops, a pair of jeans and a T-shirt have become the standard go-anywhere uniform, the lines between formal and informal have been blurred almost beyond recognition. There is little formal social hierarchy anymore, and the message is that we’re all peers. In a world where restaurant servers and grocery store clerks call customers by their first names, you’re welcome may seem too formal. Today’s hyper-casualness demands something more insouciant, something more nonchalant.

I guess that means I’d better get used to no problem. But that doesn’t mean I have to like it.