Makes me grind my teeth.

 

What bugs me the most about this is that it's the autocorrect's fault- people misspell it 'definately' or 'definatly' and despite the law of averages as to which was intended, the little fixit wizard assumes that there was a swapped pair of letters (>> defiantly) rather than the wrong letter chosen (>> definitely).

Of course, the whole thing would disappear if people remembered to spell it correctly in the first place.

 

The only common grammar error that really pisses me off is the people using 'of' when they mean 'have'.

In terms of non-grammar pet peeves, I really hate the overuse of descriptions of a character's hair or eyes. I swear, some fanfics seem to remind you that Harry still has green eyes every other paragraph.

 

What about off in place of of?

 

The use of the word 'destiny' annoys me.

 

'Private' Drive. :facepalm

 

Probably to indicate, that this place is complete bollocks?

 

Major peeve of mine is unoriginal spells in combat/action scenes, i.e. only a rehash of reducto, expelliarmus, and stupefy.

A lesser peeve is blatant Slytherin apologists. It's not unreasonable to think that not all of them are immoral future dark wizards and witches, but they're far from a house of misunderstood nice guys and girls.

 

It's a personal preference, I guess, but this can work in some circumstances. The reason it rarely does isn't because of the spells, but how the characters interact with their environments, and that's even more of a pet peeve for me. If two opponents are duking it out in a cluttered storage room, then why does the author write the scene as if they're facing each other on a duelling platform?

 

What?

Yeah, shows the author is just unoriginal. What I don't like is when authors think spells like reducto will blow people other people to pieces. I think it would be stupid for reducto to be able to harm people like that when it's being taught in a school

 

Well Rowling gave few redeeming qualities to the Slytherins and it doesn't help matters that there isn't a single likeable Slytherin canon character.
Now that I think about it I don't think I've read a single fic which actually made the Slytherins likeable.

 

Actually, a Gringotts Credit/Debit Card is just ahead of the times. Also, who else is going to be the Financial Hub? No really, who else? Wizarding nations have the populations of average/large cities.

 

With the history between goblins and wizards being what it is, I don't think they would want to do more business than is necessary. That they have the banks just seems to be leverage that they enjoy IMO.

Reading statements/portfolios? Fair enough, but would you trust investment advice from a goblin? If they would even want to give it to you, that is, but Gringotts-employed wizards are always an option.

 

Complacency is a thing, as is the old adage "Give and inch, take a mile". It's just isn't that odd to me that what appears to be the only major national banking institution would also be the center of gravity for other investments. And of course with private investors making up a substantial counter balance.

EDIT:My Pet Peeve is general lazy/poor world building in long runner fics or fics that intend to become long runners.

 

The entire wizarding world, perhaps. Whilst all the numbers are a tad dodgy, 10,000 people is a small village even in New Zealand, let alone Britain.

 

In the USA, 8,000 is considered a city. Smallish popualtion, but urban nonetheless. This should explain what we also consider rural as well. AKA the Boondocks.


20,000 is considered an average city, well beyond small town.

So uh. Yeah. Americans have a different idea of what Rural constitutes. Of course, Britain and parts of Europe could just have a stupidly low population density of magicals, with most of the rest of the world having had higher birth rates for quite a while. Who knows.

 

...I'll take your word for it. I live in New Zealand, which has a very low population density, in a town with like 80,000 people, and no-one would be calling it a city.
/OT

Whatever the case, semantics.

 

Dude....that's a large urban area. Just because it doesn't or might not have a lot of skyscrapers....eh whatever. Send a pm I guess.


Another Pet Peeve is switch and bait fanfics. Awesome premise, then they abandon it or something.

 

Fixed that for you.
Hehe.

Absolutely. This is why I think people are much better served by programs that underline misspellings, leaving you to deal with them yourself, rather than the program trying (in vain) to correct them for you.

Privates.
Bollocks.
Private Drive.
It- It wasn't a good joke...

You mean "bait and switch." You have to lure a person in with the bait, before you can switch it on them. If you switch, then bait, the person you lured in would actually be getting exactly what they came for. :mrgreen:

Also, not to nitpick but... abandoning a story is just abandoning a story; it's infuriating and disappointing, but isn't a bait and switch.

I remember one story, it was a House crossover listed as Harry/Cameron... it turned out, though, that Allison Cameron was actually Hermione Granger (see, the HP books exist in this cluster-fuck of a story, and Allison asked the author to change her name to Hermione Granger in the books, to retain her anonymity). So, the fic was really just Harry/Hermione, right?

WRONG, because Harry died not long after marrying Hermione, and the story actually ends up being House/Hermione.

What. The. Fuck. It's not like the listed pairing was an attempt to avoid a spoiler, either, because what I just described was told in a big, fat, "tell, not show" section in the first chapter. The listed pairing was just a flat out, bait and switch, lie: Advertised itself as one thing, but turned out to be something completely different.

And how about the stories that list a pairing, but then about 10,000 words in, they put up a poll for pairings... What? What's the fucking poll for, when you had a pairing listed already!?

But, yeah, bait 'n' switch and abandoning a story, while not the same, are both super irritating tricks authors like to pull.
--


Recon / Reckon
If people did a little more recon in a dictionary, I reckon they might know what the fuck these words mean.
--


Dwell / Delve
This is a weird one, no doubt, but I've seen it more than a few times, so I thought I'd mention it. It's less a peeve and more of a "What the hell? How? Why? Just... what?"

This is especially true when I run across the occasional hybrid "Dwelve" [sic]. It's like someone either isn't sure which to use, so they're hedging their bets by just combining them, or they just unconsciously merged the two words.
--


Matter / Manner
Even I am surprised at how often I see people write matter when they mean manner.

"I think it must be some matter of weapon." Really? :facepalm

For some reason, I see the reverse much less often.
--

Tack / Tact
I see a lot of people use 'tact' when they mean 'tack.'

Tack, most often in this kind of mistake, means a course of action, an approach. "Well, that didn't work; let's try a different tack."

Tact, of course, is a sense of propriety, knowing what to say and what not to say, so that you aren't rude or insensitive. Ron tends to come off as tactless, sometimes.
--


When two characters become a couple and someone close to them says some variation of, "It's about time!"

Firstly, it's been done so many times, there's very little chance you can do it in a way that's original enough to justify its inclusion. Secondly, even before it became a massive cliché, it was still rather annoying. And, finally, the biggest strike against it is when the author has someone use this phrase in reference to a pair of people who haven't even actually known each other all that long.

I saw one story where Harry had literally only known a girl for a matter of a week or two before they became a couple, and one of his friends vomited forth the dreaded, "It's about time!" as though Harry and this girl had known each other for ages and were either too blind to see what they meant to each other or were avoiding it for some reason.

It was a matter of weeks, dumbass (that goes for the character and the author)! That in no way, shape, or form merits an inane exclamation of, "about time!" as though they'd been engaged for eight years and couldn't take the next step. We've known each other for a week and a half, moron; she's not my common law wife just yet.

It should come as little surprise that this was one of the story's lesser flaws.

It's hard enough to justify the inclusion of that shit in a story, but if you write that and then immediately follow it up by having someone else jump in to point out that, due to the timing of this occurrence, they won/lost a bet on when the couple would 'finally' get together, it's time to rethink your decision to write fan fiction (as well as your decision to eat those old paint chips while doing whippits under a sheet soaked in engine starting fluid - just say 'No,' kids).

 

Seconded. I'll add "ignorant mudblood" bashing, usually claiming "wizard culture is rich and special" without offering any example.