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The Gentleman Lech FAQ

Where did the name gentleman_lech come from? The first time I was introduced to this wonderful friend of mine, she got the impression I wasn't interested because she never actually caught me staring at her boobs. I corrected that misconception as soon as I was aware of it, but it sort of led to a question. What do you call a guy who looks you in the eye when you're talking to him, but looks at your boobs when you're not? Her answer was, of course, a gentleman lech. I decided I liked it, and I've been using it pretty much ever since.

Who's the guy in your icon? The guy in my default icon is Kurz Webber from Full Metal Panic. Kurz and I have quite a bit in common, although I know far better than he does when to keep my mouth shut, so I'm not getting slapped all the time (or ever, really).

What are some of your pet peeves? I'm only going to cover online pet peeves here.

• 1337-speak annoys the hell out of me. Numbers aren't letters; please don't treat them as such. And please spell words in their entirety (seeing "ur" really pisses me off—it's not a word, dammit!); two extra keystrokes per word is not going to kill you. The occasional use of it (mostly to mock those who use it regularly) is acceptable, and often amusing. (I find the !!!!!one!!!11eleven!! construct especially amusing.) Note: I'm fine with the acronyms LOL, ROFL, and their derivatives—but please put them in uppercase so I know they're acronyms and not gross misspellings.
• I'm not a grammar nazi, but some things actually make me wince. I find them jarring because they screw up my parsing of a sentence. I actually have trouble understanding the intended meaning. Here's a partial list:
  • Any misuse of the ' character. It does not mean "an 's' follows"; it's for contractions and possessives only.
  • Mixing up they're/their/there. Their meanings are "they are"/plural possessive/locational. See there? They're not that hard.
  • Using of in place of have. It's "would have" or "would've", not "would of". (Personally, I think it's the contracted form in spoken language that's responsible for this one.)
  • Mixing up affect/effect. Affect is what you do; effect is the result.
  • Mixing up two/too/to. They are number/word meaning "also"/preposition indicating a target.
  • Using "loose" when you mean "lose". The first means "not tight" or as a verb, to set free from restraints (as in "loose the hounds"). The second is the alternative to winning. Now that I think about it, I'm not sure I've seen loose used correctly in months.
• I'm not a spelling nazi, although I do appreciate proper spelling. As long as I know what you're trying to say, I'm usually okay with it. With one exception: "Supposably" is not a word. It's "supposedly".