What? Your Sense of Touch Is Impaired? or Are You Just Guilty?
A very common mistake that a lot of people make (besides writing redundant stuff like the ten words I just wrote) is to say “I feel badly about that.” It seems that this would be correct, but it isn’t.
The reason is that little verb “feel.” “Feel” is a funny word. It can mean something tangible — like when you touch something: “I can feel the sand in the bottom of the tub.” Or it can mean something intangible — like when you sense something emotionally: “I feel hurt by her insensitive remarks.”
When you say “I feel badly,” that means that your sense of touch is not working properly. When you say “I feel bad,” that means that your emotions are negative. (Or you are sick, in which case, for accuracy’s sake, you should say “I feel ill.”)
If this is still as clear as mud to you, drop me a comment, and I will try to explain it better. It’s a muddy area of grammar that is often neglected in modern grammar classes.
If I did my job well, then all I can say is: May you never feel badly and seldom feel bad.
5 Comments
How ever are you able to hang around the blogging network if you’re an editor? The grammar and punctuation on BN is awful. Often the actual writing is pretty good. But the grammar and punctuation is very distracting.
Where do you think I get my ideas for this blog?
*raises hand*
Guilty as charged! I did not know this. I shall try to remember this in the future.
Perhaps the reason I make so many keyboarding errors is that I feel badly!
Editormum, Good one. Yes, I know about this one. But even knowing about it, I still have to consciously be on guard or I will feel “badly” about something because it is such a COMMON mistake—in the media as well as in private life. Thus the error gets constantly reinforced.