Thanks, I wasn't aware of that one. What is the correct usage for "brought"?

There were 8 definitions of brought on the web site I looked at. So the correct definition depends on the context that the word is being used in.

When i first read your post, I thought that you might have meant 'bought', not 'brought', as 'bought' is frequently used when 'brought' should be used.

Yup. Proves I'm not perfect, right? Not that that needed proving...

Spelling - I think people are born able to spell or not able to spell. I never had to work at spelling, but my sister had to study, study, study to pass a spelling test. My son would get all the right letters for a word, but rarely in the right order. My middle and youngest daughter never had a lick of trouble with spelling.

I loved diagramming sentences. I still do it too, in my head. It helps the sentence make sense.
Another one used incorrectly on here very much is advise and advice. When I give you advice, I advise you. Advice is the noun and advise is a verb. Do kids know anything about that anymore? How you pronounce them is strange, too. Advice has the ice in it and it sounds like ice. But advise sounds like it has a "z" in it.

I have a friend who drives me NUTS by always saying she "brought" something when she means "bought". I mean, really!! Small children know the difference....

I'm with Katybob ---the use of apostrophes when they're not needed drives me crazy! Case in point - on your foot you wear a shoe. What you buy at the shoe store is a pair of shoes, not "shoe's"! (Spell checker wanted my sentence to say " show" store!)

You use bring if you are physically in the place where the thing is travelling to. You use take if you are moving it from where you are when you speak.

"Bring that baby over here."
"I'm taking him into the other room."

Another pet peeve is borrow for lend. I first heard this with a co-worker from Sweden. OK, I gave him a pass, English as a second language. But I have heard many native English speakers doing the same thing. "Can you borrow me $10?"

It is too bad that writers let the autocorrect do their work and then they forget about such things as homonyms. My advice, as a former English teacher, is for those contemplating a writing career, to read, read, read and read some more in order to educate themselves as to how literature "feels" as well as looks. We'll never win this battle, but I can hope, can't I?

But he sure knows how to needle people!