Take the column on apostrophes, published a couple of weeks ago. The responses came from a wide area, even California. I had happened to mention the name of Jeff Rubin, from the USA but I did not know where he lived. The next morning the same Jeff Rubin, of Pinole, California, sent me a note saying the article was excellent. He invited me to call in one day for morning tea. Perhaps he thought I lived around the corner.

I have visited nearby Tulare occasionally.

The article, in case you missed it, asked why we persevere in writing things like “member’s testimonials” knowing that the organisation we are writing about has more than one member. I had seen Jeff Rubin in a photograph pointing to such a sign.

Then I received a note from David Taylor, of Dubbo.

He didn’t just complain about apostrophes. He threw in his opinions on such subjects as newspaper proof readers (“is that a joke nowadays”) hear hear (“I’ve seen that as here, here”), “he told you and I” and a whole host of other matters that I don’t have room for here.

I have to say, however, that editorial quality was not the job of the proof reading department but of sub-editors or copy editors, who spent a lot of time checking material submitted to them. The proof readers, under the old system, ensured that the printers set into type what the journalists wanted. Of course, if there was a mistake the subs could always say “those proof readers didn’t pick it up”. Naturally, I never did that.

The responses I got to the column indicated that many people think about apostrophes and the grammar we use. I saw another sentence the other day that said “the charity’s I have been involved with”. It went on to say “charity’s like…” indicating that it wasn’t just a typo.

I know that some people say things like “If you speak it you don’t indicate where the apostrophe goes” but that does not mean our writing should be sloppy.

The apostrophe can indicate a missing letter (don’t instead of do not) or can indicate possession (Bill’s car).

It has a long history, but can be traced to Greek meaning something like turning away, but I didn’t study Greek, even though David Taylor did.

I saw a sign recently that said something like “we are out of banana’s”. I once saw a correction to a recipe that said something like “in our recipe for banana cake last week we accidentally left out the bananas”. That was nothing to do with apostrophes, so you can stop looking.

But I also saw a sign that said goods for sale were suitable for “school’s, stag’s, hen’s, pub’s and club’s”.

David Taylor mentioned that I had written about apostrophes a year or so back. I can’t remember it but I do remember seeing a big sign in a Dubbo main street shopping centre that made me cringe every time I saw it. It was still there last time I looked.

I saw the last episode of the Peter Allen story.

Did you notice that whenever Judy Garland entered a restaurant she was almost invisible to the other patrons?

Maybe they thought she worked there, or just stepped off the rainbow.

lauriebarber.com; lbword@midcoast.com.au