Potty or Pottie?
It finally happened. I had suspected that with Lynn Johnston whipping back and forth between reprinting strips from the first year and the second year, she would eventually reach a point in her reprints where she would reprint one she already reprinted. And yet, the strip being reprinted is not exactly the same as before. When today’s reprint in For Better or For Worse was reprinted on Wednesday February 13, 2008, the spelling Elly Patterson used was “potty”. Today it is “pottie”.
Here is my theory on what happened. As near as I can tell from searching .uk and .ca websites, even in England and Canada, “potty” is considered to be the correct spelling. However, in England, the word has some extra meanings:
1. Chiefly British Informal. slightly insane; eccentric.
2. British. paltry; trifling; petty.
Maybe Lynn Johnston remembers these alternate definitions with her English background of language use, and got confused. Maybe Lynn said to herself, “Well, it couldn’t be spelled ‘potty’ because that means ‘insane.’ So it must be spelled ‘pottie’ to distinguish between the two different versions.” With this logic in mind, she altered the spelling and then reprinted the strip again. After all, if you change the spelling of one word in a strip, it is essentially an all-new strip, eh?
Aside from this confused spelling, the whiplash I am feeling from the “Connie and Elly talking about Phil” sequence we had yesterday has increased my confidence in my belief that Connie Poirier is not going to be taking that humiliating trip to Montreal to chase after Phil Richards. Maybe that series of new-runs put that storyline to rest. If so, I approve wholeheartedly. I never liked that story in the first place.
Here is my theory on what happened. As near as I can tell from searching .uk and .ca websites, even in England and Canada, “potty” is considered to be the correct spelling. However, in England, the word has some extra meanings:
1. Chiefly British Informal. slightly insane; eccentric.
2. British. paltry; trifling; petty.
Maybe Lynn Johnston remembers these alternate definitions with her English background of language use, and got confused. Maybe Lynn said to herself, “Well, it couldn’t be spelled ‘potty’ because that means ‘insane.’ So it must be spelled ‘pottie’ to distinguish between the two different versions.” With this logic in mind, she altered the spelling and then reprinted the strip again. After all, if you change the spelling of one word in a strip, it is essentially an all-new strip, eh?
Aside from this confused spelling, the whiplash I am feeling from the “Connie and Elly talking about Phil” sequence we had yesterday has increased my confidence in my belief that Connie Poirier is not going to be taking that humiliating trip to Montreal to chase after Phil Richards. Maybe that series of new-runs put that storyline to rest. If so, I approve wholeheartedly. I never liked that story in the first place.
posted by howard at 9:59 PM
13 Comments:
The Oxford English Dictionary doesn't recognize "pottie". This isn't just some little pocket dictionary, but the definitive 23-volume set, so Lynn has managed to come up with a brand-new word. Perhaps I shall submit it the next time Balderdash and Piffle is on TV.
The earliest known recorded use of "potty" is 1941 in an advert in the Oakland Tribune (California) on 26 December 1941, so it isn't even British English but American English. Perhaps Lynn believes "pottie" is the Canadian spelling.
forworse,
Perhaps Lynn believes "pottie" is the Canadian spelling.
If so, she's alone. She might succeed in spreading this error to the impressionable minds of Kool-Aid Nation in the same way that the solecism "nuke-you-lar" has borrowed its way into the language but she does so in error.
howard,
I'd like it if the trip to Montreal could have been averted myself. Too bad that it seems to me that Connie will want to prove Elly wrong. She seems to be behaving like a teenager who thinks her mommy means well but doesn't get it so she's gonna run off and make a jackass of herself.
I believe that "pottie" is how she spelled it in the original. I can't seem to find the strip in the collection, even though I've leafed through it three times this morning. I'll try again when I don't have "morning" brain. But what I suspect happened is that when she reprinted it the first time, LJ took a moment to edit her misspelling. This time, she just didn't care enough to notice or bother.
And I was also thinking "whiplash" with this sudden shift away from Connie's storyline. At least I still have some continuity with today's FOOBAR. :)
forworse,
The Oxford English Dictionary doesn't recognize "pottie". This isn't just some little pocket dictionary, but the definitive 23-volume set, so Lynn has managed to come up with a brand-new word.
It’s good to have confirmation from the highest rank of the English language.
Perhaps Lynn believes "pottie" is the Canadian spelling.
This is possible. Although Lynn has been favouring US spellings lately, so she may think it is US.
DreadedCandiru2,
She seems to be behaving like a teenager who thinks her mommy means well but doesn't get it so she's gonna run off and make a jackass of herself.
After the new-runs this week, if Connie does go to Montreal, then that is very much like the way she will come off, as a teenager trying to spite a parent.
aprilp_katje,
But what I suspect happened is that when she reprinted it the first time, LJ took a moment to edit her misspelling. This time, she just didn't care enough to notice or bother.
I suppose if she can’t be bothered to realize she has reprinted this before in the last year, what is a spelling error correction compared to that? I believe we are reaching new heights of Lynn Johnston laziness.
KAN believes that words are spelled the way Lynn spells them, period. If they thought the word was spelled differently, THEY are in the wrong, not Lynn. So what they thought was "Stupid" is actually "Stewpid," and when they use Lynn's spelling in an email and the recipient corrects them, the recipient is just a hater who Simply Doesn't Get It.
I can imagine these idiots clucking " the root word for 'prairie" is 'prayer,' you know."
John_F_Jamele,
KAN believes that words are spelled the way Lynn spells them, period. If they thought the word was spelled differently, THEY are in the wrong, not Lynn.
Of course. That fits right in with their thinking other things that have no basis in reality (e.g. "Thérèse is an evil, reptilian puppy-eater from another planet", "Mike is the Savior of Canadian Literature", "Anthony is handsome, witty and charming", etc.) because she says so. Since she's the author, things must be what they say they are; if the evidence of their own eyes contradicts their flawed god, they're in the wrong.
John F Jamele,
KAN believes that words are spelled the way Lynn spells them, period. If they thought the word was spelled differently, THEY are in the wrong, not Lynn.
I guess in this case, KAN believes there are two spellings, because Lynn Johnston used both spellings each time she reprinted the strip.
Ugh. I don't see this as a random misspelling or even an American v. Canadian thing. I have noticed a subcategory of dopey, cutesy women who think that every word that ends in a hard E sound should be spelled "ie" instead of "y." I would never have thought to put Lynn in that category (I think of her as strident, abrasive, and unstable rather than as dopey and cutesy), but maybe that's how she was in her younger days and she's only become embittered with age.
qnjones,
I have actually known a fair number of women who were dopey and cutesy as well as strident, abrasive, and unstable. In my experience those characteristics sometimes go along very well with each other. When I think about some of the interview videos I have seen with Lynn Johnston, it could work as a description for her.
today she spelled "weird" wrong. i guess she HAS lost it.
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