In which I am sure to irritate many people I love

But they can also bite me.

Memo to grammar cops: Back off!

The usually estimable Laura Miller is far too kind. This Jack Lynch can bite me. So can Laura Miller. I'm embarrassed on behalf of my Lynch relatives. If I was related to any Millers I'd be embarrassed for them too.

Yes, standards can evolve, but they are not to be capriciously discarded.

I admit that I may be overly sensitive after seeing "Amelia" this afternoon. The film has been criticized for its reliance on voice-over narrative, but the words are Earhart's, and function in the film not only to add emotional color but, much to Hilary Swank's and director Mira Nair's credit, to demonstrate what a deft and delightful prose stylist she was, and what a writer and thinker we lost along with the adventurer, feminist, and pioneer.

A friend of mine frequently said, in defense of unorthodox and trendy constructions, "Language is a tool." Of course, but our most relied-upon tools -- hammers, knives, shovels -- have changed very little over the years, and what changes there have been brought about much-welcomed improvements in design, durability, and efficiency. Change in the service of nothing but change, though, is sloppy and unreliable. The introduction of nouns like "blowback" is inevitable and often useful, but lapses like "rate of speed," "point in time," and "impacted" are merely lazy and indefensible. English is erratic enough without such challenges and offenses.

Old-fashioned? A crank? On this topic yes, I am, and proud of it. I prefer to think of myself as a traditionalist, not in the sense of excluding innovation, but in the sense that there are traditions that deserve to be preserved.