As many of you know, I live in Kentucky. The education system in this state is sorely in need of an overhaul. Perhaps the most obvious symptom of the problem is the state of language skills (though poor use of language is a nationwide problem, sadly). My name is an instant point of contention. I'm often referred to as, brief and sharp as possible, No!, instead of my real name: Noel (2 syllables).
I mentioned intentional misspellings as a pet peeve of mine. That is torture to me.

I'm certainly not the resident avitar of English, but I feel I'm at least striving to improve my use of the language.
I know that we inherit aspects of our speech from our parents and that we're subject to the local nuances of spoken word too, but people just seem lazy these days.
Americans will say twunny instead of twenty.
Gunna and gonna mean 'going to'.
Fer is for.
'Ahm gunna go to the store fer milk. I took a twunny off the dresser...'
Many people will insert verbs into sentences in strange places. Take, for example.
'when you get to the store, take and get me some brie too'
One of the more common misuses of a word (and personal pet peeve of mine) is the tragic overuse of the word LIKE.
Like has become a very multidimensional word it seems. A millenium smurf.
'when he said that, I was like... and he was like I don't care'
I suppose there has been a tremendous 'dumbing down' of the citizenry. A coworker of mine happened upon me looking through a catalog from the Sadigh Gallery (a purveyor of antiquities). He asked me, "what's that?".
"Ancient art", I answered. He walked off, shaking his head. "You're crazy", he stated, as if I were a complete freak.
So perhaps people read (much) less than their parent's generation and television has rendered our minds feeble with short attention spans and a constant influx of rubbish.
I need to think about this more.
Cheers, Noel
no method, no guru, no teacher