It was my name first.

As if having a name as common as Katie Parry wasn't bad enough, someone had to come along and sing a song about kissing a girl and liking it. Katy Perry: no dankes.

Now let me just say that I like my name. I often introduce myself with both first and last name - which often gets me the stink eye from strangers. My friends frequently call me by both. Katie Parry just has a nice ring to it. So yes, yes I do like my name. Aside from the fact that my parents decided to change the common spelling of Katherine to the less "Polish" sounding K-a-t-h-r-i-n-e a couple of weeks after taking me home from the hospital. Aside from the fact that it comes up on every single spell check ever (and as we all know, I love me some spell checks). Or the fact that it's been spelled incorrectly on my credit cards, report cards, cards I get in the mail. Or that of the 100ish seniors in my high school graduating class, there were four chicks named Katie.

And, oh, the fact that I've never, ever heard of another Kathrine until last summer when a nurse at the doctor's office told me her daughter's name was spelled the same way. Um yeah, they didn't know how to spell Katherine when they immigrated to the U.S. and only later discovered that "Kathrine" was...well...not the right way.

So, fine - if my first name has always been the boring bottom half of the cake, then my last name is for sure the delicious vanilla icing with sprinkles. Or, to put it another way (sorry, sweets are always on my mind) - I love, love, LOVE my last name. It's silly, yes. But true. Even though people consistently spell the latter half of my moniker incorrectly, I always take pride in saying, "Parry, p-A-r-r-y" - so much cooler than Perry! And there's a far more magnificent definition for the A vs. the E - I mean, "fermented drink usually made with pears" - really? Who's ever heard of that. On the other hand...

parry: [par-ee], -ried, -rying, noun, plural -ries.–verb (used with object)
1. to ward off (a thrust, stroke, weapon, etc.), as in fencing; avert
2. to turn aside; evade or dodge: to parry an embarrassing question.

So much better!

But to be fair, dictionary aside, let's put it to a for reals test. Katy Perry vs. Katie Parry. Lay it all on the line. Who would win? Based on my extremely complicated scoring system, let's see:

• Super cute outfits (for the most part), +75
• A few hit songs, +125
• One horrific Grammy performance, -100
• The inability to come up with an original song title (this one's for you, Jill Sobule), -65

TOTAL: 35
VS.

• I am bigger and would kick ass in a cat fight, +25
• I cannot sing for the life of me...unless I am karaoke-ing in K-town and I've had a few bottles of that disgusting green alcohol (what is that stuff, anyway??), -50
• When I was in ninth grade I briefly dated someone with the last name Perry, -100 (I know, I know. But I swear we weren't related!)
• It was my name first, +35, AND mine has a way more spectacular spelling, +500

TOTAL: 410
Looks like it's 35 vs. 410. So I guess I have to say sorry, Katy, I win.

My relationship with Katy Perry is fairly hot and cold - no pun intended. I do like some of her songs I suppose. They're catchy. And I obvi love cherry Chap Stick. However, I do NOT like my middle-aged coworkers saying "Oh, Katie Parry, did you kiss a girl?" Or people approaching my parents, asking them if it was me on the radio. I'm sick of friends (who will remain anonymous) writing on my Facebook wall:


Have you kissed any girls lately??
March 2 at 3:56pm



And above all else, I'm sick of people not believing me when I introduce myself as Katie Parry. Goddamn you Katy Perry! It was my name first! And again, lest anyone forgets, the spelling of mine is infinitesimally better! So please, go change yours!!! And people, leave me alone!!

(If you have any doubt in your mind that I should not have won the Katy Perry vs. Katie Parry contest, please - watch this:


...that's what I thought). I rest my case.

i before e except after...wait whaaaat?

Dear friends and strangers. You know who you are. You who always fail to put the “i” in the middle of definitely and instead put an “a”. You who fail to recognize the apostrophe in words like you’re and instead say your, thereby changing the connotation entirely. Ah hem, American Eagle:

(Dummies!)

To you I say: Come ON!

My very good friend – who shares my loathing of people who misspell simple things like, well, "misspell" - how embarrassing! – came up with a nickname for us: Grammar Police. We are warriors of the word. We, too, sat through Mrs. Smith’s middle school lectures on homophones and conjunctions, on the usage of singular vs. plural, and the simple rule of i before e except after c. So why, my fellow mid-20ers, WHY have you not retained these rules?

Fine. I’m a self-proclaimed grammar snob. It’s my numero uno pet peeve. But it’s a pretty benign one on the pet-peeve-spectrum. There are so many tools, you grammar offenders, at your disposal nowadays. You can be über conscientious with the simple click of a button. For starters, http://www.dictionary.com/. How novel! Email providers offer spell check. There are innumerable books and websites (ever heard of a little site called Google?) on the subject.

To plug one we publish (because really how can I not...you should go buy it, it's pretty great - http://www.amazon.com/before-except-after-Parkinson-Judy/dp/0762109173/ref=sr_11_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1238423072&sr=11-1ie=UTF8&qid=1238423072&sr=11-1) .

Now I know I'm not perfect. Far from it. I've had the Grammar Police take me to the smack down hotel a few times in the not-so-distant past. I like me some abbreviations, some inventions, some slang, some swears. There are probably mistakes in this here blog. But when technology has made things so goddamn easy for us, how can I not judge you for spelling something wrong? All you need to do is click that little check mark at the top of the screen. So easy!

No dankes! No dankes people who say too instead of to, than instead of then, your instead of you’re! In the whiny voice of Charlotte à la "Set the date! Set the date!" I shall impart these three little gems of wordly wisdom to you: Check the spelling! CHECK THE SPELLING!

Above all else, if there is one thing that I can drill into your brain that Mrs. Smith failed to, it is this: You have to be in it to win it. If you take nothing else from reading this blog while you should be doing your work, it is that you WILL LEARN HOW TO SPELL DEFINITELY. To spell definitely you must be in it, as in definitely. There are no a's in this fine word and never, ever will be. No, most definitely not. Not ever. So stop trying to put them there!

Really, there is nothing worse than poor grammar. I find this perfectly succinct:

So my parting words to you, dear friends and strangers, are simply:

Check the spelling! Check the spelling!

Cacophonous Kiddies

Yes. It is 3:10am. Indeed it is. And I am on Blogger.

Why, you might ask? No. No, it's not because I'm just so excited about today's blog that I couldn't sleep. I'm not that devoted.

It's because apparently I missed the memo that TODAY is in fact Mardi Gras, not February 24th like I had originally thought.

Either that or those spoiled NYU kiddies are just soooo excited they graduated, they felt the need to wake up the entire neighborhood.

After a lovely evening of $6.50 pitchers, beirut, and bcq's (buffalo chicken quesadillas...if you haven't tried, you haven't lived...and I don't think we can be friends anymore), I fell blissfully, tipsily asleep with my window open, a lovely breeze ruffling my shades. It was Friday, I'd had a delish din, and all was right with the world.

Insert record screeching sound effect.
WTFFFFFs, yo! Why oh why do people think it's OK to blaaaaast ridiculous music, shout, blast RIDICULOUS music, and shout??? It's a weeknight, ya brats. I've contemplated, in no particular order: screaming out the window for them to shut up (but I know from experience that this will rile them up even more); marching out there and yelling at them (but I'm far to passive for a confrontation such as that); calling the police (aren't there laws against noise?); having another beer (to ease me back into dreams of bcq's); closing the window (but the air is so nice!); taking some sort of sleeping aid (but I don't want to be groggy in the am!). 

Ugh, carefree little chillens. I hate you and your lack of responsibility, your jaunty jovialness, your sickening sunniness. But most of all, I envy your ability to get perfectly sauced on a Thursday night, party in the street, and wake up the entire neighborhood. 

I'm taking a Melatonin, shutting the window, and turning on my AC. I have to go to work in the morning. Night, ya jerks!