(Click to enlarge photo)
Colgate really means business! Its "Total" product claims to fight 12 teeth in addition to gum problems. I wonder if the formulation is smart enough to know exactly which 12 teeth need to be fought in any given mouth....
A Little Trick
When I was a kid, my Mom taught me a trick to avoid these kinds of errors, and I use this trick today. For a sentence like, "Fights 12 teeth and gum problems" (in which there are two objects), you can check the grammar by removing one object to simplify the sentence. "Fights 12 teeth problems" is obviously wrong - it should be, "Fights 12 tooth and gum problems".
I find this trick most useful for resolving I/me conundrums. Often, people make the assumption that "I" is somehow always better grammar than "me" - as in the sentence: "You and I are like two peas in a pod" (in which there are two subjects). In that sentence, "I" is correct, because you would not say "me is like a pea in a pod."
But what about this sentence: "They notified everyone but you and I" (in which there are two objects)? If we use the trick my Mom taught me and removing one of the objects we quickly see that "me" is correct in this case, because we would say, "They notified everyone but me."
Put another way, use "I" when you are the subject of the sentence and "me" when you are the object of the sentence ... most of the time, anyway (hey, this is English!).
Thank you for sharing these useful tricks. I have automatically used them since high school, and in my case my 'teacher' was literally just that. More people must be encouraged to use devices like that to sanitize their spoken and verbal communications.
Posted by: Gord Richardson | March 27, 2007 at 12:15 PM