I’ve just seen a van which boldly proclaims on its side the promise of ‘professional bin cleaning services’. Exactly how does one measure the professionalism or otherwise of a bin cleaning service? I can only think of one metric which could apply:
1) Is the bin clean?
Surely even the most amateur bin cleaner could manage to clean one with a reasonable degree of efficacy? Admittedly the more novice bin cleaner among us might miss the odd spot here or there, or perhaps leave residues or traces of unspeakable decomposing horror in its deepest, darkest corners.
Professional indeed. Pshaw.
This puts me in mind of Wrigley’s Orbit Professional chewing gum. I’m always puzzled as to whether this is a product aimed at those who have taken mastication ‘to the next level’, as it were, or a gum that has itself striven and progressed through the ranks of amateur and intermediate confectionary to emerge clutching a briefcase and roaring down the phone at its subordinates. The mind boggles.
Shouldn’t that be ‘confectionery’, pertaining to confections as a whole as opposed to a single item of ‘confectionary’? I get myself terribly confused with this one, and Fowler’s is of no use whatsoever on this particular subject.
pe·dan·tic /pəˈdæntɪk/
–adjective
1. ostentatious in one’s learning.
2. overly concerned with minute details or formalisms, esp. in
teaching.
(You’re right of course, but I normally have my editor deal with these minor matters of spelling and suchlike…)