One Way or Another Trivia Quiz

Answer: L

The misuse of 'me' and 'I' is a fairly frequent error, as it seems many people had drilled into them that 'I' is more correct. 'Me' is often correct too, though. A good trick to deciding which one to use is to remove the other person. You wouldn't say "The party will be hosted by I", you'd say "The party will be hosted by me". Just because you've included Ted in the sentence doesn't mean that 'me' should be 'I'. Now, if you wanted to say it in the active voice instead - "Ted and I will host the party" - then 'I' is indeed correct, because you wouldn't say "Me will host the party".

Answer: R

The sentence has an error. "Could of" is not correct. "Could have" is the correct phrase; it does sound similar to "could of" when contracted ("could've") but cannot be written as "could of".

Answer: Both can be considered correct. Keep going straight.

Both judgment and judgement are acceptable spellings, but depending on where you live, one may be preferred. 'Judgement' is often seen in British English, but so is 'judgment' sometimes; the Oxford English Dictionary prefers 'judgement' but acknowledges 'judgment' as an alternate spelling. 'Judgment' tends to be the more preferred in American English.

A legal judgment, though, is nearly always spelled without the extra 'e' in the middle.

Answer: R

I quite like using semicolons, so this is a bit of a personal pet peeve of mine. A semicolon can only be used if you could also use a period in the same place. In other words, the two phrases you separate with a semicolon need to be complete sentences on their own; using a semicolon instead of a period is a style choice when the two ideas are closely related.

In the sentence in the question, "if someone brings a net and a ball" is not an independent clause that can be a complete sentence by itself, so we can't use a semicolon there.

A comma would be fine; leaving it with no punctuation there at all would also be more correct than using a semicolon.

Answer: L

'Peruse' is widely used to mean to skim or to read quickly, but that is actually incorrect. The word's actual meaning is to read something thoroughly, or to examine with great care. It's one of those words that has been so commonly misused that the informal wrong definition is starting to become accepted in some cases; the vast majority of dictionaries will still tell you the traditional meaning, though.

Answer: L

I.e. and e.g. are commonly confused for each other, but e.g. is correct here because the sentence is giving an example of one of the many other activities you can participate in at the beach party. E.g. stands for exempli gratia - for the sake of example. I.e. stands for id est - that is (or that is to say). I.e. is correct when you are saying again what you just said in other words, or further defining what you just said.

A trick to decide which one you want to use is to substitute in the words 'for example'. If it makes sense, e.g. is what you want to use. So in this case, the sign at the landmark is telling you "If you don't want to play volleyball, there are many other activities you can take part in, for example the sand castle contest".

Answer: Disinterested. Turn right.

When someone is unbiased or impartial (in this case Bill, because he won't choose one side over the other), they are disinterested. Uninterested means bored, or simply not interested. The sentence tells us that Bill is eager to take on the role of referee, so he is not uninterested.

The incorrect usage of disinterested has become so common that many dictionaries acknowledge that bored or not interested can be an alternate meaning - but unbiased and impartial is not an alternate meaning of uninterested.

Answer: R

"Should have went" is not correct. When following the word 'have' with a modal verb (could have, would have, etc.), you need the past particple. 'Gone' is the past participle of the verb to go, not 'went'. For regular verbs, the past participle is usually same as the past form (e.g. "I stopped" and "I should have stopped" are both correct; stopped is the past form and the past participle), but the verb to go is irregular. "I went" is correct but "I should have went" is not; it should be "I should have gone", or in the case of the example sentence in the question, "You should have gone".

Answer: Infer is correct. Turn right.

Infer means to come to a conclusion based on evidence or deductive reasoning, rather than having it outright stated for you. If there were a sign saying "Beach - right over there", you wouldn't be inferring because the conclusion is explicitly stated for you.

The word imply is closely related, but does not mean the same thing. Imply means to strongly suggest something without saying it outright - when you imply something, you want someone to infer your meaning.

Answer: This sign is grammatically correct. Join the party!

It's correct, welcome to the party! You've is the contraction of you have. You're in the process of arriving at the party, so it's correct. If it simply said 'You arrived', that could be an hour ago, or a week ago, or more. The comma is necessary, to separate the two ideas of getting a hot dog and having a cold drink (grammatically anyway, you can enjoy them together). We're excited about the party so exclamation marks are perfectly acceptable in these sentences!