Grrrrrammar rant...

Every day I walk past a little cafe and it irritates me. It's in Sutton, and they've called it Sutton Snax's. That's just so wrong on so many levels. I mean for a start, how the hell do you pronounce it? Snackses? I could understand Snax, in a txt spk sort of way. But to chuck on both an S AND an apostrophe is just plain bizarre.

And today I got a letter from a girl wanting a job... And bearing in mind, this is someone who is 30, not a 17-year old school leaver, and it was written on a computer. I have written it here exactly as it appeared on the letter:

"Are you looking for a self motivated and someone who thrives on a challenge? I'am currently looking for a rewarding career in Mortgage Sales, I have a wealth of knowledge. especially in the adverse Mortgage Market. I have moved down very recently from Scotland and is a permanent move, the reason for an employment break. I'am studying for cemap qualifications from home and is totaly self funded, however I need the right job to compliment this..."

It's a shame - I bet she'd be really good at her job. But I could never employ her. With all the paperwork that we have to do, I just couldn't trust her. I am amazed that she doesn't know the difference between a full stop and a comma; or the difference between I am - I'm and actually uses the bastardization of I'am....

I don't know... It takes 10 seconds to run a spell-checker. And there are mistakes on her CV as well - proffesional, was the worst of the lot.

I know that there are plenty of people that cannot spell and haven't been taught correct grammar usage; I also know there are plenty of people that are dyslexic and simply cannot help the fact they can't spell. But sorry, now that every computer has a spellchecker, I'm old school on this. In a previous life I was a manager in charge of 80 people. I would get hundreds of CVs sent through. If a CV had more than one spelling mistake in it, it went straight in the bin. Not because they couldn't spell - I would happily employ someone with dyslexia, if they used a spellchecker. I wouldn't employ them because it just showed a total lack of attention to detail.

I know that today's teachers are not really pushing grammar and spelling in the way they used to... But I also know telling kids that spelling and grammar is not important is NOT preparing them for the outside world. Because I sure as hell won't employ someone who would send a letter to the outside world written like that.