Tonight I watched a few minutes of CNN-I with my friend, who said she watches it about three times a year for English practice. It didn’t take long for me to get mad -- a reporter made a per usual snide remark after a story fairly early on. Of course I got madder when my friend said on this side of the pond they take everything CNN says as gospel....but I’ll stop there.

Anyway, she flipped through the channels during an hour or so break <which was the first I’ve seen her take>, and came upon an old episode of Mad About You. We sat and watched it for awhile -- sadly I was unable to follow the rapidito espanol and I hadn’t seen the episode when it aired <which could have been ten years ago for all I know>, so I wasn’t too sure what was going on. After flipping through a few game shows and the news from Spain <which is all tragedia all the time she said>, we were done.

In the midst of all that I made a faux pas when one of the kids came in with their English homework. It was a “have got” lesson and you were supposed to conjugate the verb appropriately. My mistake came on the first question:

My best friend _____ a CD player.

Would you say, my best friend has a CD player, or would you say my best friend has got a CD player? The book said has got and without thinking I said, well that’s not right, then immediately realized:

1. I probably didn’t know what I was talking about anyway since I never took grammar and, when trying to get my book into shape, my editor gave me quite a lot of crepe over who and whom <I said sometimes whom just sounds stupid and I don't care if it's technically accurate>, and
2. even if I was correct, it probably wasn’t wise to question a textbook in a foreign country. I could just envision class tomorrow -- I’m sorry, but my American friend says your book is wrong.