OK, maybe I’m getting a little anxious about the impending thesis, but this kind of thing really irritates me. Yes, I did really send this off. Not waiting breathlessly for the response.See the actual flyer at the end of the post.
Dear Tsunami in Morningside
I was at your restaurant for lunch on Sunday the 3rd February with my 2 daughters. We spent the meal entertaining ourselves with finding new and hilarious spelling errors on your Valentine’s Special flyer.
I found eight. One spelling or grammatical error would be bad enough, but EIGHT! Actually ten, because two of the mistakes were repeated, which shows that they are not just typing errors. If it wasn’t funny it would be very, very sad. These are the kind of errors one would expect when reading a menu in China or Thailand, but not in Morningside.
When I tried to point it out to you, you brushed me off and told me, “not to worry about that.”
I am not going to worry about it, I did not pay for the flyers. You are the one who should be worried. You paid for something which is so far below the minimum standard of professional typesetting and printing that you should have sent it back. If my food had been this bad, believe me, I would have sent it back.
In case you can’t pick up the errors, here they are:
- Valentines Special should read Valentine’s Special. Note the apostrophe. (Repeated twice)
- What is a hale shell? Did you mean whole shell?
- The correct spelling for vulavong is vol au vent.
- The correct spelling for pastory is pastry.
- The correct spelling of muster is mustard.
- What is a malai sauce? did you mean malay, as in coming from Malaysia?
- The correct spelling of mirengue is meringue.
- The plural of strawberry is strawberries. Strawberry’s means something else entirely. (Repeated twice)
I know that you probably think that this is nit-picking. It is not. THIS would be nit-picking:
- If there are 4 Salmon Roses there should be 4 Fashion Sandwiches. If the one is plural, then the other should be too.
- Why do Prawns and Chickens have capital letters, but not mussels or calamari. Is it because they are a lesser life form?
- Using & and and in the same sentence or even in the same flyer is sloppy. Choose one and stick to it.
You may not think it matters, but it does. HUGELY. Restaurant competition in Sandton is fierce, you cannot afford to appear slipshod and unprofessional for a second. From now on I shall go to a restaurant that shows more attention to detail. Quality control front of house is an indication of what goes on in the kitchen.
Kind Regards
Nicole Mason
I’m so glad you’ve taken up your blog again, Nicole – I really missed your very funny and perspicacious posts. And, as a grammar Nazi (and proud of it), I agree wholeheartedly with this one.