Quoting DJ Doena:

Quote:
Quoting VibroCount:

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Attention: The Apostrophe Police have arrived.

Not written by anyone competent in either the English or American language.

You may want to tell Rick this.

Sorry, Rick, no offense.

PS: Isn't "the police" singular ("has arrived")?

Yes, and no. If I were referring to all the Police, it indeed would be singular, and require the verb has. But in that I was referring to a member of said Police (me), and collective nouns will be followed by a plural verb if the predication is about the members as individuals, as in "A number are unable to be present", the collective noun ought to be have.

See? 

Quoting VibroCount:

Quote:
Quoting DJ Doena:

Quote:
Quoting VibroCount:

Quote:
Attention: The Apostrophe Police have arrived.

Not written by anyone competent in either the English or American language.

You may want to tell Rick this.

Sorry, Rick, no offense.

PS: Isn't "the police" singular ("has arrived")?

Yes, and no. If I were referring to all the Police, it indeed would be singular, and require the verb has. But in that I was referring to a member of said Police (me), and collective nouns will be followed by a plural verb if the predication is about the members as individuals, as in "A number are unable to be present", the collective noun ought to be have.

See? 

But, of course, Karsten is correct. The full sentence would be "A member of the Apostrophe Police have arrived." 

If a few of us had arrived, my grammar would have been correct. (Didn't my backup arrive?)

None of which alters the fact that there is an extranious apostrope in the rule.

Quoting hal9g:

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Quoting VibroCount:

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But, of course, Karsten is correct. The full sentence would be "A member of the Apostrophe Police have arrived." 

If a few of us had arrived, my grammar would have been correct. (Didn't my backup arrive?)

Sorry , but this should be "A member of the Apostrophe Police has arrived."

When constructing a sentence which has a prepositional phrase between the noun and the verb, you should remove the prepositional phrase when selecting the correct verb form:

"A Member has arrived" is correct.  "A Member have arrived" is incorrect.

I contain multitudes.



YES! You nailed it!


Which is why Karsten was correct all along. Only if more than one member of the Police (but not all) had arrived would my original sentence be correct.

Which was my point -- I was quoting myself with the full sentence, which I noted was incorrect.

Quoting lyonsden5:

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Quoting DJ Doena:

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Maybe we should just change the wording in the rule from "series" to "season(US)/series(UK)".

That would help. We should also remove the "rare cases" reference since these are common now.

I guess an example would help more than anything else 

Quoting Grendell:

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Quoting VibroCount:

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This rule contains an incorrect "it's".

That's actually a pretty easy rule to remember... "it's" means "it is," so if you're unsure if you should be using an apostrophe or not, simply try reading your sentence with "it is" instead of "it's," and if it doesn't sound right, then it's "its".

Yes, and, again: "... please note that the possessive form of it does not take an apostrophe any more than ours, yours or hers do..." ... simple pronoun possessives...

It's a madhouse....a madhouse!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Skip

Quoting lyonsden5:

Quote:
correct

Or This: 

Or This: 

Or This: 

Or This: 

Etc., etc

or this