How to sound more intelligent - part two

A lot of people - public speakers in particular - attempt to sound fancy by manipulating the English language in strange and obscure ways. They replace words like 'me' with 'I', saying things like:
"So when that Microsoft representative rocked up to our front door and offered Erwin and I the job, my heart, like, jumped out of my chest. I was so excited!"
Read: it's Erwin and me, not Erwin and I. See Part One.

It's like using a sword as a walking stick instead of a weapon. I mean, sure, it does the job, but it makes you look silly. Also, playing with grammar is a lot like playing with a sword. In a word: don't.

These same people also prefer to use 'myself' when they should have used either 'I' or 'me'. They do it like this: "If you have any questions, please talk to Leonard, Janora, or myself [me] at the end of the discussion." Argh! They remind me of those people who insist that the sun revolves around the earth, and not the other way around. Okay, fine, I don't know anyone who believes that, but you get the idea.

Part two: when to use 'myself' in a sentence

The word 'myself' is a reflexive pronoun. The reason that it's a reflexive pronoun is because it reflects onto an earlier noun used in the same sentence. The earlier noun is like its mother, and they're connected by an umbilical cord, which I can't draw.

'Myself' can be used here because it's referring to the 'I' preceding it. If there was no 'I' acting, then there would be no reason to use the word 'myself'.

All reflexive pronouns are the son or daughter or their mother noun.

As you can see, the reflexive pronoun gets its life from the mother noun to which it reflects. It can't breathe without it.

So, when you use a reflexive pronoun without giving it a mother noun, it suffocates. The reflexive umbilical cord has nothing to attach itself to, and the son or daughter dies.

So many people make this mistake, yet they wouldn't say, "Please talk to myself afterwards"; they'd say, "Please talk to me afterwards". The same applies here. When you add Leonard and Janora, nothing changes. 'Me' is still the correct term to use.

In short
reflexive pronouns come with umbilical cords. They must have a mother noun, or they will die. Moreover, you'll sound silly.

Part three: words you should stop misusing

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How to sound more intelligent - part one

Some of the most common discrepancies in the spoken English language can weaken the best of us at the worst of times like a fatal chink on solid steel.

There are those of us who care enough to fix it, those of us who don't realise it's there, and those of us who don't care either way; after all, it's not like anyone else cares.*

*I do.

But it's one thing to have learnt good grammar before discarding it like a Best Buy circular because you opted for sounding cool rather than smart, and quite another thing to claim to appreciate things like brains, words and fountain pens, only to open your mouth and reveal to every passer-by that you are, in fact, the fountain pen. Don't look at me like you don't know what I mean.

Part one: there's a difference between I and me

At some point in our childhood we were saying things like, "Me and Jimmy are going to the park." But then our parents were all, "Jimmy and EYE," and they'd repeat this phrase a gazillion times like they had grammar tourrettes. Then we hit adolescence and stopped caring about our parents' wellbeings, and about grammar. Okay, fine, we never cared about grammar.

The problem was, thanks to the adults in our lives, the word 'me' was expunged from our vocabulary and replaced with the far more pristine 'I'. So, ironically, for the few brats young adults of us who might have once cared about grammar, there was no room left for 'me'.

Stuff we were taught as kids:

1. Don't say 'me'; say 'I'
2. Put yourself last. Say 'Jimmy and I', not 'I and Jimmy'.

Fun fact #1: rule 2 is table manners, not actual grammar.

Fun fact #2: 'me' still exists.

Stuff I've learnt as an adult:

1. People who say "me and Jimmy" don't care about the rules, whether or not they know them. 
2. People who say "Jimmy and I" do care about the rules, but, more often than not, only know half of them.

Here's the other half:

'Jimmy and I' is correct in this sentence: "Jimmy and I are going to the park."

'Jimmy and I' is incorrect in this sentence: "A man approached Jimmy and I and offered us candy from his van." Such a nice man.

You: Why is the second sentence incorrect?

Me: I'm glad you asked!

Method A - easy answer:

When you take "Jimmy" away from the sentence, you're left with "I".

     "Jimmy and I are am going to the park." :)

     "A man approached Jimmy and I and offered us me candy from his van." :(

The second example sounds silly, right? 'Me' should have been used instead of 'I'. 

     "A man approached me and offered me candy from his van."

Much better, now add Jimmy.

     "A man approached Jimmy and me and offered us candy from his van."

Easy, right? I'm getting goosebumps.

In short 
the phrase "Jimmy and I" is not always correct. To find out which of 'me' or 'I' is correct, simply get rid of Jimmy. He was more a neighbour than a friend, anyway.

Method B - boring/technical answer:

'I' is a subject pronoun; 'me' is an object pronoun. The subject is the thing that acts; the object is the thing that gets acted upon.

"Jimmy and I are going to the park."

In this sentence, Jimmy and I are the subjects. They are going to the park, which is the object.

"A man approached Jimmy and me and offered me candy from his van."

In this sentence, the man is the subject, and he's approaching the objects, which are Jimmy and me.

Other subject pronouns include 'he', 'she' and 'they'. Other object pronouns include 'him', 'her' and 'them'.

In short, stick with Method A.

Part two: how to use 'myself' correctly

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