READING the recent letters from Mark Boyle and John Macnab regarding bad grammar, I found myself laughing. I’ve been banging on for years about four such words which are used constantly, namely “hopefully”, “obviously”, “basically” and “actually”. Sometimes two of them are used in the same sentence or worse, side by side. A young footballer on TV once used “hopefully obviously, blah blah”. On other occasions, I find myself shouting at the TV when someone keeps saying “obviously” over and over: “It might obvious to you mate, but not to us!” The latest one to surface is the adverb “really” usually used to describe something hot or huge or (insert your own word here) as in “really hot” or “really huge”. Compound this with repeating it endlessly as “really really really uncomfortable”, OK, we believe you. It was uncomfortable. TV presenters are the worst for this. I obviously must stop actually shouting at the TV.
Ian McDonald,
2 Stuarthill Drive,
Maryburgh, Dingwall.
IN response to Kate Gordon's "Pronounced disagreements" (March 19). I can put forward no justification for the annoying examples described. The reasons are probably the same ones that cause contestants on TV game shows to applaud themselves when they get an answer correct, to pronounce the letter "H" as "haitch", or for the hosts to talk about the contestant with the "most" points when there are only two contestants, or "less" when they mean "fewer" points.
Brian Johnston,
3A Charlotte Avenue, Torrance.
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