Off of
'Off of' makes me laugh, it's usually used for comedic effect on Scott Mills though of course.

example: "David Hasselhoff, off of the eighties". It's daft, he's not really from the eighties specifically, but he is associated clearly with that period. He is obviously associated with many other things, but it seems funny to pick one, especially something that many other people are associated with and is certainly not specific to him.

It's funnier than "David Hasselhoff, off of Knightrider", which other than being grammatically horrible, is more specific than the eighties - a more general term.

Why the fuck am i banging on about this.

Also, "Eats Shoots and Leaves" annoys me. It's capitalised (correctly) because its a title but the book is about grammar. That phrase is unusual as a title, it would be more commonly found in a sentence and thus "Eats shoots and leaves". I think the captalisation detracts from it's intended point.

But then, noone would buy a book called "Grammar and that". Although, actually, that's not bad.
( I have run out of coke is a little sweaty, Wed 2 Apr 2008, 13:43, Reply)