"Orthography is the science of the dunce" - when I was growing up in France that was one of these sayings. I was very good at orthography (and grammar in general), and I think that generally I can still write decent French if I concentrate enough and can find the words.
Spelling mistakes really annoy me. Mine even more than other people's, but as I generally do not re-read whatever I write I tend to see that less.
Bad spelling is endemic though, even with people whose job it is to write (e.g. journalists). How many times do I get infuriated when reading the BBC news website and see somebody who is paid to write prose enter stuff like "compliment" for "complement", "it's" for "its". It's not THAT hard is it, if even a Frenchman can get those things right?
But no. It's there. Is it laziness or ignorance? Well I guess to the vast majority of people it doesn't matter. Only sticklers like me get wound up about it (well, within the boundaries of my own knoweldge of course...).
A few years ago I read "Eats, shoots and leaves", and I felt soulmate-y with the woman who wrote it (Lynn Truss?).
On the other hand it worries me that I should be one of those anoraks or people who get wound up about futilities like that.
Oh I'm not aging well. The grey hairs are eating at my positive brain cells.
P.S. Thanks for not pointing out spelling mistakes in this post.
