Writing & Grammar: Comparisons and Pronouns... The Results

by Jennie Ruby

Results are in for last week's question about the meaning of this sentence:

My boyfriend loves soccer more than me.

The choices were A and B:

1. My boyfriend loves soccer more than I do.
   
   
2. My boyfriend loves soccer more than he loves me.

By a large margin, you readers said it means B. Literally, in print, that is the official meaning. But this was more of a survey than a quiz, because even though that is the way this sentence should be understood in print, most people don't use sentences like this one correctly in the spoken language. So if you said A, that is still a valid choice-for the spoken word.

My question for discussion next week is this: how would you spell and punctuate these possessives?

1. We went to Mike and Sues house for dinner. [Mike and Sue are a couple and co-own the house.]
   
   
2. There were so many of us that we had to take both Mike and Deweys cars. [we took two cars, one belonging to Mike and one belonging to Dewey]
   
   
3. George said that we should take Mike and his's cars.
   
   
4. I think we can all fit in Mike and I's car.

Send us your answers and I will post the results here. [Hint: a past article on our blog might give some insight.]

***

About the Author: Jennie Ruby is a veteran IconLogic trainer and author with titles such as "Editing with Word 2003 and Acrobat 7" and "Editing with MS Word 2007" to her credit. She is a publishing professional with more than 20 years of experience in writing, editing and desktop publishing.