If Only I knew what an Oxford Comma is…

I love wordplay and idioms as seen in many of my blog posts (If Only I knew what that idiom meant… • If Only (if-only.net)).  And then Grammar Walks Into A Bar and my life.  Whoever came up with these is an absolute genius, but unfortunately, the source is incredibly well hidden or it is really an amalgamation of contributors. 

But I can admit, the first one had me scratch my head a bit.  An Oxford comma walks into a bar… If you read my blog regularly you will see the Oxford comma is a regular participant, much to my chagrin.  Please note, this is only because my editor requires it.

The Oxford comma comes from the Oxford University Press and is known as the serial comma; a punctuation mark used before the conjunction (and / or) in a list of three or more things.  I have found it is most helpful on menus, but can be useful in other, everyday situations as well. 

The lunch entrée comes with a choice of a side, salad and bread

vs.

The lunch entrée comes with a choice of a side, salad, and bread

He found himself in the Winnebago with his ex-girlfriend, an herbalist and a pet detective

Vs

He found himself in the Winnebago with his ex-girlfriend, an herbalist, and a pet detective

I love cooking, my pets and my family

Vs.

I love cooking, my pets, and my family

Not sure why, but someone thought we needed a t-shirt to help with the Oxford comma:

There have actually been court cases decided on the lack of the Oxford comma and so you should consider if you should use it, think you should use it or want to use it.  Rewrite:  if you should use it, think you should use it, or want to use it. 

A fun comma example could also be:  “Let’s eat, Grandma!” vs. “Let’s eat Grandma!” 

Now the question is:  will you use an Oxford comma?

Enjoy Grammar Walks Into a Bar:

• An Oxford comma walks into a bar, where it spends the evening watching the television, getting drunk, and smoking cigars.
• A dangling participle walks into a bar. Enjoying a cocktail and chatting with the bartender, the evening passes pleasantly.
• A bar was walked into by the passive voice.
• An oxymoron walked into a bar, and the silence was deafening.
• Two quotation marks walk into a “bar.”
• A malapropism walks into a bar, looking for all intensive purposes like a wolf in cheap clothing, muttering epitaphs and casting dispersions on his magnificent other, who takes him for granite.
• Hyperbole totally rips into this insane bar and absolutely destroys everything.
• A question mark walks into a bar?
• A non sequitur walks into a bar. In a strong wind, even turkeys can fly.
• Papyrus and Comic Sans walk into a bar. The bartender says, “Get out—we don’t serve your type.”
• A mixed metaphor walks into a bar, seeing the handwriting on the wall but hoping to nip it in the bud.
• A comma splice walks into a bar, it has a drink and then leaves.
• Three intransitive verbs walk into a bar. They sit. They converse. They depart.
• A synonym strolls into a tavern.
• At the end of the day, a cliché walks into a bar—fresh as a daisy, cute as a button, and sharp as a tack.
• A run-on sentence walks into a bar it starts flirting. With a cute little sentence fragment. Falling slowly, softly falling, the chiasmus collapses to the bar floor.
• A figure of speech literally walks into a bar and ends up getting figuratively hammered.
• An allusion walks into a bar, despite the fact that alcohol is its Achilles heel.
• The subjunctive would have walked into a bar, had it only known.
• A misplaced modifier walks into a bar owned by a man with a glass eye named Ralph.
• The past, present, and future walked into a bar. It was tense.
• A dyslexic walks into a bra.
• A verb walks into a bar, sees a beautiful noun, and suggests they conjugate. The noun declines.
• A simile walks into a bar, as parched as a desert.
• A gerund and an infinitive walk into a bar, drinking to forget.
• A hyphenated word and a non-hyphenated word walk into a bar and the bartender nearly chokes on the irony.