Why do I yammer on about the continued slaughter of our language? Not 100% sure, but I’m thinking it’s for the same reason that people rant about inconsiderate drivers, putting an empty carton of orange juice back in the fridge, not wiping one’s feet, chewing gum like a cow, cutting in line, or having 30 items at the express check-out. In other words, it’s not a life-threatening issue, like the tragedy in the Gulf of Mexico or second-hand smoke, but it’s important to me. Everybody got a cause, I guess. This is mine.

This, of course, does not mean I think I’m perfect. I’m also not indicting anyone’s character, although I know I can get a bit snarky or impatient from time to time. I don’t advocate grammar jail, either, honest. Rather, I rail for purposes of enlightenment and the Public Service Announcement regarding this specific subject. The end.

The title of the following list was my second choice, because this is a family show. Therefore:

How to Not Sound Like an Unintelligent Donkey

1. This is an outdated word, but lots of people still mangle it. They’re called “warmups” in gym class now, but they’re calisthenics. Don’t say “calisthetics” because it’s similar to “athletics.”
2. The name of the Mexican city of Tijuana contains only three syllables: tee-hwa-nah. The extra “A” sound is, well, just extra. Ti-a-juan-a.
3. Speaking of the extra “A,” it’s biathlon and triathlon. Just three syllables. Bi-ath-a-lon? No thanks.
4. “Preform” is definitely a word, but it doesn’t indicate what actors and musicians do. That would be perform.
5. This one drives me nuts, and I’ve heard it from super-educated people. A “pitcher” is a container from which Kool-Aid or tea is poured, or the person who throws to the batter. A photograph is a PICture, from which comes that annoying, infuriating, fingernails-down-the-chalkboard abbreviation, “pic.”
6. If his lungs took in too much water and he died in the lake, he drowned. No such word as “drownded.”
7. Honestly, it’s es-cape, not “excape.” Kind of like the ultra-bizarre “expresso/espresso” issue I recently lived through on Facebook.
8. If I had a dime every time somebody said “bob wire,” I could retire. As much as we may not like it, it’s barbed wire.
9. If something is sacred or held in reverence, it’s “hallowed,” right? “Hollow” is something that contains a cavity or large gap. All Hallows Eve is called Hallowe’en — it’s not hollow; it’s hallowed. Savvy?
10. Don’t be a hick  — avoid saying “vee-HICKLE.”

To those who say, “Relax! It’s just English — don’t get so worked up about it!”, well….refer to the list title. Whatever gets you through the night.

Happy Saturday — I’m off to Stein’s wedding, yay!

English speakers are a frightful lot in the first place. Matters worsened with the “shorthand” craze brought about by MySpace, text messaging, Facebook, Twitter and the like. And it’s not just “kids,” believe it. A shining example:

Dandy.

I will refrain from launching into a diatribe about other issues involving grammar and usage (adding useless letters to the ends of words, typing “lol” after every sentence, typing “plz” instead of going to the extraordinarily burdensome trouble of adding three more letters, using “your” where “you’re” is required, throwing in apostrophes like there’s no tomorrow, etc.), but rest assured, it’s on the way. Unfortunately, I’m out of time.

I am proctoring an English exam today at school. Coincidence?

I wish I could remember what I was reading yesterday morning. It was an interview with a military officer or university official or something…blah, I can’t recall. Anyway, I was reading through his comments, and stopped dead when I read, “And all the sudden…”

After that, I lost interest. Does that make me a bad person? I honestly don’t think I suffer from elitism here. I just mourn the death of our national grammatical conscience is all. Doesn’t anyone care anymore? Does no one care that horrible grammar makes one sound stupid? *sNiFfLE*

Then I had a thought (sometimes I do that). There are movements and causes everywhere. We are a nation of causes. Save the Whales. Save the Donkeys. Save the Butterflies. Save Route 66 (yay!).  Save the Old Jail downtown. Save the Outer Mongolian Tree Spider. TWITTER, fuh cripesake (aka Save the Random, Inconsequential Thoughts).

Well then, how about:

I mean, really. What defines a nation *first*? Its language; its primary form of communication. I know of no other language that is so routinely and indiscriminately mangled. Yes, yes, we’re a melting pot — a tossed salad — e pluribus unum, blah, blah. No excuse, sorry. Especially for native speakers. And I’m not talking about slang, or accents and regional idiosyncrasies (for instance, in Milwaukee, where I went to elementary and middle school, a water fountain was called a “bubbler”). Those are fine, and in many cases, interesting and fun.

RtB fiends know what I mean. I won’t go into it at 5:58 a.m. But listen. If we’re going to champion this cause (notice I’ve dragged you all into this), we need a way better slogan. I love the “Bad Grammar Destroys Nations” thing — but I can’t steal someone else’s gray matter.

So come on. What can fit on the front of a t-shirt? Certainly not the above logo, which I slapped together in 45 seconds. I promise to come up with something better. I’m willing to throw money at this, swear.

Sixth grade choir had better be fabulous first thing this morning…

Fink, in a mood

This morning, while doing the obligatory phrase search (to avoid title clash; 518 posts in only 17 categories can stretch the originality a bit), I found a rant I posted three months ago. I laughed — did I really write all that craziness? A friend told me several weeks ago that he’d gone through RtB in its entirety over an extended period, and read every post. I’m not sure I’d want to do that myself, for fear of editing every post. Anyway.

It made me think about how different we all are, and in the funniest ways. For instance, waiting at a railroad crossing — even when I’m in a hurry — doesn’t bug me. Yet, I know people who will rant at the train as if the conductor planned to intersect their path at that particular moment. The Thriller doesn’t mind cruising in the left lane on the interstate, but it makes me want to squirm right out the window (he knows this, and, I’m convinced, derives some small-but-evil pleasure out of doing it on purpose).

So, what niggling issues (I love the word niggling) make you squirm? You know a lot of mine; let’s hear some-a yurrin. Still, I am beholden to my fiends to insert my list forthwith, though few will surprise:

Things That Bug Me

1. Posters or TV commercial graphics that say there are “1000′s of items” available. “One thousands” of items? And worse, “One thousand–apostrophe–s” of items? Yark.
2. Inserting the infuriating “and” when talking of numbers and dates. What year is it? Why, it’s two thousand and nine. NO, it isn’t. It’s two thousand nine. Say it. 2009. Two. Thousand. Nine. What, Americans can’t comprehend a complex number so we need to break it up into smaller chunks by saying and? Then there’s money. The dress was two hundred and fifty dollars. NO….it was two hundred fifty dollars. I swear we are the only culture on the planet that does this annoying thing. Some folks don’t care about it at all, but to me, it’s like chewin’ foil.
3. Unrinsed dishes in the sink. Arrrrrg! OCD! OCD! (Fortunately, that doesn’t happen at my house.)
4. People crying, “OCD! OCD!” at every little stupid thing, like putting dishes in the sink.
5. “All the sudden.” I mean it. Next puppy that crosses my path gets it.
6. Touching wood that is wet, like washing a wood-handled knife. Sets my choppers right on edge.
7. Always, always, always, always reaching into the wrong pocket.
8. Tripping over shoes left on the floor. (And they’re always mine.)
9. Calling the tech support line for a huge corporation and hearing, “our office is now closed…”

So share. Maybe I’ll discover other things that, if they don’t bug me now, will potentially bug me in the future because you implanted the suggestion.

Snark Fink

EDIT 10:04 a.m….

This is the coolest and most creative thing I have ever seen on YouTube.

1. Almost identical
2. Past history
   
3. Quite/very/really unique
4. An added bonus
5. Tuna fish

And some all-stars on my peeve team:

1. Controlling his/her/their own destiny
2. My bad
3. Same difference
4. Literally
5. Ironic (when something is in fact just a strange coincidence, having nothing to do with irony)
6. Happy/unhappy camper
7. All the sudden
8. Staycation (I mean it. I will hit you.)
9. Git ‘er done (See above.)
10. Referring to a presentation at a meeting as a “piece” (“Regarding the education piece I talked about the other day…”)

And there are many more, but I’m out of time. I covet your peeves. Please post them here for all and sundry — especially if you hate the phrase, “all and sundry.”

The Thriller and I are off to Potter matinee madness today. Fun.

Fink out.

All right: here’s a list that makes me itchy-scratchy. Sometimes things don’t bother me regarding usage, like ending a sentence with certain prepositions (as long as it isn’t “at”). Sentence fragments. Don’t. Bug me. Usually. Unless they’re in a research paper.

I’m not the Knot-See I used to be; I’ve mellowed in my dotage. But some things do send me, darlin’. They make me want to say, Hey, c’mere. Got somethin’ for ya. *KaBLaM*

Many of the following have been mentioned in previous Schmenglish posts over the last year and a half, so 1,000 pardons (but they do bear repeating). It’s kind of my “Best Of” project. You know, the album that artists release in order to cash in twice on the same material? Well this is that, only without the cashing-in part. So, without further delay, and in random order:

Schmenglish Peeves

1. “The Fink’s blog is better than Perez Hilton’s.” Why thank you, doll. But please don’t write that something is better then anything.
2. You’re going to a birthday party today. Your not going anywhere.
3. To little, to late. I can hardly type it. Is it too much to ask to remember to use the extra “o” when you write about that which is excessive or in addition to something? Or do I have to do that for you, too?
4. Bananas. Pianos. Calculators. I will slap the pretty right off your face if you write banana’s, piano’s or calculator’s. Word.
5. If I see another writer for a major publication (we’re talking the Times, the Post,  the Globe, and the place where all bad writers go to die: ESPN.com) say something like, The company would benefit it’s investors by selling off it’s assets, I am going to punch stuff. I mean, really. It’s is a friggin’ contraction of “it is.” When will they ever learn? Where have all the flowers gone?
6. Could of/would of. Why do I get so upset about this one? Why do I imagine myself repeatedly bopping someone on the back of the head while shouting, “COULD HAVE! WOULD HAVE!” with each blow? I could of daaaaaanced all niiiiight…. Honestly. Some things make me want to kick and punch and scratch and maul.
   
7. “I seen her at the bank yesterday.” You would be surprised at how many educated people seen folks here or there or yonder.
   
8. Who vs. that (and the “vs.” stands for versus, not “verse.” Just sayin’.). You would once again be surprised to hear things like, “Students that plan to play volleyball should meet in the gym,” or “People that text while driving are more prone to accidents.” No, luvs. People get the “who” — things get the “that.” I hate things that make me mad and people who don’t care about how stupid we appear when we can’t master our own language.

Unfortunately, that’s all I have time for this morning. Must get those tour letters done. Mavis is helping me today, bless her heart. That will likely improve my sour mood.

I should do a Part II of this list. I think I might. I probably will.

Happy Monday — shyeah right.

Speaking of prepositions, I took an easy quiz this morning. But this one was interesting, because it uses British English. It was surprising to me (even though I scored 100%, shameless POM wannabe that I am) how different it is from American English. Take it and you’ll see what I mean.

I ran across Schott’s Vocab blog on the Times site. Love his stuff (and this is on my birthday git list). Last night I read about different words and phrases that families use – you know, interesting combinations of words — or made-up ones altogether — that constitute their own special language. For instance, my kids and I always called the television remote a” widget.” Gatorade was always known as just “Gator.”

Trying to remember more of them, but coming up empty at the moment. Maybe Lars will recall something.

What were/are some of your families’ weird sayings? I covet them.

Fink out of space.

As I’ve said before in my other Schmenglish posts, I am not nearly the grammar N**i I used to be. For good or ill, I’ve mellowed with age, like the fine, stinky cheese that I am.

Still, I believe that our character, at least in part, is defined by how we communicate using the spoken and written word. And few would argue that Americans have a big fat problem in that area, especially with regard to usage, pronunciation and spelling. Therefore, for the common good, truth, justice, and the American way, I offer the following additional caveats. Of course, the happy words are in green, and the crappy in red.

1. Majorly is slang. [Not that slang is wrong, mind; I use it a lot, and I think it's great. It just has its place.] The citizens of Paris were majorly angry with the aristocracy in 1789. Don’t put that in a music history research paper. Ask me how I know this has been done.
2. Here’s one of my favorites. Being raised Baptist, I was taught to abhor any reference to the term “Xmas,” because it was “taking Christ out of Christmas.” I heard stories that went so far as to suggest it was the Romans who replaced the word “Christ” with an X. (This brings up so many bizarre linguistic incongruities, I won’t address them here, or #2 will go on all day.) Truth is, friends: relax. The “X” in “Xmas” is actually the Greek letter chi, used regularly to indicate the name of Christ — not extricate it. All is well.
3. There is no “D“ in congratulations. Simply saying “congrats” to yourself will solve the problem.
4. Speaking of stinky…my friend and colleague at school has a vile habit of bringing little mini-cabbages to eat for lunch. When she heats them in the microwave, the entire teacher lounge smells like sixteen cats crawled into the drop ceiling three weeks ago and died. I am not exaggerating. It is the most hideous, rotten stench I have ever had the misfortune to endure. What are the little stinkbombs she actually puts into her mouth? Brussels sprouts. Not Brussel, but rather, the city in Belgium for which they’re named. In my opinion, these agents of olfactory death should have never made the trans-Atlantic trip in the first place.
5. If your name is Jill, wouldn’t it annoy you to be called “Jell?” Or if you’re a Bill, “Bell” instead? I thought so. Therefore, intelligent people, stop saying melk and pellow. It’s civically irresponsible, and if I hear you do it again, I will have to kell you.
6. You can be a great person who is grateful. Any other spelling of this word grates on me.
7. A koala is a marsupial — not a bear.

Had enough for one day? I thought so. Good thing too, because I’m out of time. Gotta git.

Fink out(ta here).

Sometimes I want to give up the fight. Yesterday, three of my middle school students used the word “brung.” Cripes.

I’ve been told I’m too picky about grammar, that nobody cares anyway, and that my grammar peeves are probably outdated. For instance, I insist on saying “thee end” instead of “thuh end.” I hate the question, “Where is it AT?”

[I will say that I have loosened up a bit in my advancing age. Thirty-five years ago, I would have never begun a sentence with "and" or "but," or written in a style that incorporates the occasional sentence fragment. I do both all the time now. But I digress. And I am good at digression.]

I hate it that some of my students think their poor spelling skills are funny, and that they have no trouble at all saying with a smile, “I can’t write” — followed by a shoulder shrug.

Or they say, “Hey, we’re from (insert small Ohio community here),” as if to say (sing), “Folks’re dumb where I come from — they ain’t had any learnin’…”

It makes me sad. And the problem is not limited to the nation’s youth; it knows no age, social class, or (unfortunately) level of education. Years ago, I worked as a secretary to a university official. I would secretly correct his horrible grammar and countless spelling errors as I typed his correspondence. I had a high school education; he had two graduate degrees. Go figure.

Still, I am compelled to do my part — however inconsequential — to promote safe and healthy written and oral communication in my little corner of the world. I shall press on.

Fink out.

PS – Wahoo!!!

I was wrong.

Right now, Mavis and I are reading the Anita Blake series by Laurell K. Hamilton (come on, a girl’s got to have some reading material that does not involve research methodologies). I love all things vampiric; always have, ever since picking up Interview With the Vampire after seeing the movie back in the 90s. Her stories are great, and there’s always an unexpected deus ex machina moment, designed to assure the reader that the stories will continue. Total fun.

Anyway, while reading the first book, Guilty Pleasures, I noticed a couple of errors. You know, minor things, like transposed letters or a missing word in a sentence. I thought, that’s all right, just a typo. No problem.

However, with each successive book in the series, the mistakes began to pile up. Things like “I was loosing the battle,” and “He was smarter then that,” started to irritate me — a lot.

Hamilton’s rampant use of alright is bothersome, too, although the word has been so overused that it’s now a basically accepted part of the American lexicon. Still, why wasn’t it caught and corrected? It makes the word nerd in me absolutely howl.

Then there’s this, over and over and over:

“‘Oh, really?’ She made it a question.”

“‘You knew about this?’ I made it a question.”

“‘Are you in love with him?’ He made it a question.”

What does that mean? Of COURSE it’s a question. So, you’re asking a question, then telling the reader that you phrased the question as a question…STOP IT. I am going mental.

While I love the story lines, and Hamilton’s style is hip and smart-aleck, I can’t get past the myriad mistakes in usage and spelling, and her bewildering phraseology (not to mention an annoying penchant for committing paragraph after paragraph to describing what a character is wearing). Does that make me a bad person? I make this a question.

I went to LKH’s MySpace page the other day, and read that she doesn’t maintain it herself. But the site assures that she does read it. It also unfortunately says that Laurell “definately is enjoying MySpace.” Arg. More points off. Her own website — laurellkhamilton.org — is equally amateurish. **FAIL.**

Who knows…maybe Penguin Books thinks people who buy mass-market paperbacks won’t know the diff. But if I were a #1 New York Times Bestseller List author, I’d for dang sure make certain that everything going out to the public under my name was at least grammatically correct.

Hey Laurell — fire your editor and HIRE THE FINK!

Then I heard it.

It was a commercial for the Kirk Herbstreit High School Varsity Football Series (Herbstreit’s initial claim to fame was playing quarterback for Ohio State University back in the early 90s). The announcer said it three times:

Canton McKinley verse Cathedral

Cardinal Mooney verse Covington Catholic

Washington verse Jordan”

A (supposedly) professional TV commercial production team making this big of an error is bad enough; letting it slide through to air unedited/uncorrected is downright nasty. What am I going to do with these people?

I emailed their media person about it. She will probably come to the same conclusion as many others: I am a wackjob.

But I don’t care — it’s my party and I’ll rant if I want to. Sometimes, it’s you VERSUS the world.

F.O.

Someone got so annoyed with the misuse/misunderstanding of the fallacy of begging the question, he made an entire (albeit satirical) website about it, complete with printable error cards, gently reminding offenders of their bungle:

Now that is fabulous. I urge you to copy this picture and save it. The next time an anchorperson misuses the BTQ phrase on your local television or radio news (wait for it, it’ll happen), email the picture to the station.

I especially like the section called “Frequently Begged Asked Questions.” Heh. And lo and behold, he shares my disdain for the biggies:

• Could of, would of, should of
• “I could care less”
• Apostrophe abuse

And, oh bliss and joy, he also has merch.

This is going to be a good day.

Fink out.

Today’s hyper: hypercorrection. It happens when a person, in an effort to say something correctly, overcompensates and ends up adding more to the word or phrase than what should be there.

While there are several ways to linguistically hypercorrect, today we shall focus on Americans using non-English words. Ready?

1. It’s smor-gas-bord. Smor. Kind of like the graham cracker and marshmallow and Hershey bar thing you used to make over the camp fire. Smor – gas – bord. Not shmorgasbord. Comes from the Swedish smörgås (sandwich) and bord (table). [In Swedish, it is the combination rs that is pronounced 'sh.']
2. Taj Mahal. How did you just say it in your mind as you read it? Probably the way 99.9% of all Americans pronounce it: like the name Zsa Zsa Gabor. (Remember her, fellow Old Ones?) Actually, native Hindi speakers (so I was told by one — a college student back in the early 80s) say it like so: Tahdj. Rhymes with Dodge.
3. Same deal with the Chinese city of Beijing. In Mandarin, it’s pronounced Bay-Jing, as in “Jingle.” Here is the audio proof. And while we’re on the subject…
4. Parmesan. Ok, this one’s tricky. “Parmesan” (pronounced just like it’s written — sounds like Amazon) is an Americanized version of the original name for an Italian cheese, made in the Parma, Reggio Emilia, Modena, Bologna and Mantua provinces, called Parmigiano. Now don’t go Frenchifyin’ it — it’s pronounced par-mi-JAH-no. Choose one or the other, but please don’t zhu-zhu them together and say, with a French flair, parmezhan. I keel you.
5. How about Xavier? There’s a university in Ohio by that name, so I hear it a lot. (Uh, notice “a lot” is TWO words…) It’s pronounced Zay-vier. Like xylophone and Xerox. Or you could say eks-ylophone and Eks-erox, if you wanted to. But then I would hit you.

But seriously, folks. I really do share the Schmenglish posts to remind my own bad self to be careful as much as anyone else. Heck, I struggle with a word or two, now and then. My worst (and repeated) offense: imaginative. It’s never looked right to me. I have been caught out by the spell checker several times after writing a paper in which I absentmindedly used imaginitive. It’s a dumb error, too. Just think “imagination” and change the last 2 letters. But noooOoO. So, see? I am not a perfect “everyday” speller. Almost…but not.

I just believe that how we write and speak as a nation says a whole lot about how we think and what we hold dear. A country’s language is a huge part of its legacy; ya just don’t mess with that.

Fink out (of words for today)

Ugh. Anyway.

Here, for your listening and dancing pleasure:

Nasties for Which Folks Should Get Mandatory (Grammar) Jail Time

1. It’s realtor (two syllables). Not real-a-tor.
2. Mischievous has THREE syllables: MIS’-chie-vous. Miss Cheevius was your 4th grade teacher, and she did not have a sense of humor or a proclivity for pulling silly pranks.
3. Someone who builds brick structures for a living (or, as in Adam R’s case, someone belonging to a secret society of satanic axe murderers posing as upstanding pillars of the community) is a mason. Masons practice masonry. May. Son. Ree. Mason-ary is not a word. Embrace that truth.
4. Your voice box — the organ in your neck that houses your vocal cords — is called your larynx. Lare-inks. Lare-inks. NOT lare-i-nicks. Two syllables, friends. Only two. And watch out for the “ynx” and “nyx” confusion.
5. Et cetera is a Latin phrase meaning “and other things.” Notice it is two words. Excetera is, well…wrong.
6. Ku Klux Klan. This clan of idiots reportedly derived their name from the Greek kyklos, meaning “circle.” Notice there is no “L” in the first word, so please resist the uniquely American temptation to add stuff to make it sound cooler. So when you speak of them with repugnance (which you should always do when you speak of them at all), get a clue; don’t say “Klu.”
7. This is a case of subtracting a syllable, which is equally as offensive as adding one. The word referring to a group or series of elements which are ranked is called a hierarchy. Not high-arky, but higher-arky. Let’s get the height of our arkies straight, shall we?
8. Interpret. Not in-ter’-pet. There’s an extra “R” in there, sweety.
9. If you say acrost one more time, I am going to slap you across your face with a trout.
10. Sandwich, people. It’s sandwich, named after the Earl of Sandwich, John Montagu, who was said to be “an inveterate gambler who ate slices of cold meat between bread at the gaming table during marathon sessions rather than get up for a proper meal” (Online Etymology Dictionary). It’s not samwich or the even more ridiculous sandridge.

So there’s the list for today. Trust me, I got a million of ‘em, so the above does not indicate the final Schmenglish post. I just wonder where we went wrong, you know? You never hear of a Mexican or Puerto Rican person butchering Spanish, or a Parisian speaking French all wrong. Maybe it’s because English is such an international language that there are undoubtedly more chances for people to abuse it. But why is it abused so badly in our own country?

I’m all for informal writing. A cursory perusal of this very site will reveal a metric ton of slang. (See?) It’s in the everyday usage department that we seem to not care about falling off the grammar wagon. This is war, friends. Somebody hep me, because lest we forget:

Fink out.

Therefore, I have taken it upon myself to be a grammatical Johnny Appleseed, trekking about the countryside, planting saplings of nutritious…ah, nevermind.

Here are more niggling (I like that word) issues:

Begging the question. Sometimes, people say that something “begs the question” when they really mean it “raises the question.” Begging the question is an example of circular reasoning:

1) Murder is wrong. Abortion is murder. Therefore, abortion is wrong.

2) God exists. The bible says so, so that proves it.

[I'm not stating an opinion on #1, and I do happen to believe that #2 is true. Just sayin'.]

I’ve read many journalists (who should know better) whose work misuses the phrase “begs the question.” Consider this byline in a news story: Obama’s success in the primaries begs the question: Who will be his running mate? I think the writer wanted to say that the running mate issue is a question begging to be answered — but it’s not “begging the question.” Sadly, I believe the phrase has been misused and overused to the point of becoming an accepted part of the lexicon. Silly writers anyway.

Mute versus moot. A person who cannot speak is mute. A point or argument that no longer matters is moot.

The drink produced by forcing very hot water through finely ground coffee is called espresso.

If you want to sterilize your female dog or cat, you hire a veterinarian to spay her. After the surgery, you can say your dog has been spayed. “Spaded” means you’ve shoveled up the garden.

Five feet, two inches describes my height. Rhymes with sight, light, might, right. Heighth ain’t a word.

This –> * <– is an asterisk. Isk. Isk. Isk. Not asterix or asterick.

It’s nuclear. Think of putting the words “new” and “clear” together. I think George Bush either says it wrong on purpose because he thinks it’s funny to make his handlers and speech-writers perspire, or he’s too dumb to know the difference. I hope it’s “A.”

I think that’s enough for today. I feel like spending the rest of my Sunday in a lackadaisical fashion. (Not laxadaisical.)

Grammar Fink