You Cannot Be Serious, # 72

These come via Gary Hazell. The top screenshot is taken of the company’s website (where one of the many mangles has now been corrected), and the other from its Facebook page. A cynic might say the copy had been rushed out to take advantage of circumstances:

Link: PhilosophyFootball.com, ‘Muhammad Ali’

Link: Facebook, PhilosophyFootball, 4 June, 2016, 10:42

WE REMEMBER £5 FROM EACH SHIRT, solidatirty, dinated, suppoters, anti-war, pro Civil Rights; persoinal

Not Washed or Cooked, # 303

Gary Hazell spotted this on Facebook:

Link: Facebook.com, The Swindonian

The headline is correct on the website, but its address suggests this is where the error originated:

librarires

Handritten, # 6

Gary Hazell is surprised by a description on the board of tasting notes for guest ales at the Gluepot public house in Swindon:

larger bitterness

Apostrophe catastrophe, # 92

Even though he’d previously spotted mangles in Reed’s job posts, Gary Hazell was taken aback at this one which, as the second screenshot (edited to include only the later section headings) shows, went on and on:

Link: Reed.co.uk, ‘Production Engineer — Swindon, Wiltshire’

you’re for your (x3)

Problem punctuation, # 12

Gary Hazell is uncertain whether or not this is a good price:

Link: Facebook page for Westmead Garage, Swindon

£150,00

Not Washed or Cooked, # 234

Gary Hazell has found a subpar heading on an employment agency webpage:

Link: Reed.co.uk, ‘Qaulity Engineer’

qaulity

Mangling Meaning, # 18

A short season of things that don’t really say what they mean, or perhaps don’t mean what they say, begins today with this contribution from Gary Hazell:

Problem punctuation, # 4

Gary Hazell contributes this, from a tee shirt sold by the Pilgrim Bandits, a charity founded by Special Forces veterans:

The quotation comes from James Elroy Flecker’s ‘The Golden Journey to Samarkand’:

THE MASTER OF THE CARAVAN:
But who are ye in rags and rotten shoes,
You dirty-bearded, blocking up the way?

THE PILGRIMS:
We are the Pilgrims, master; we shall go
Always a little further […] 

Quoted from the version on Ruth’s Jordan Jubilee: The Country and the People of Jordan

Clearly someone has tried hard to adapt this for comprehensible use without the need to identify the dramatis personae and thus has inserted (some) speech marks. However, something seems to have gone very wrong with this process, while changes to the punctuation (notably the removal of both the question mark and the comma preceding ‘master’) and capitalization cause some confusion. The alterations to ‘“You dirty-bearded, blocking up the way?”’ suggest the line is not fully understood.

It might have been better to quote the Pilgrims’ words alone (and remove the ‘master’), since these both make the Pilgrim Bandits’ point and make perfect sense without the Caravan Master’s question.