Joho the Blog
An Entry from the Archives

I can type "an apples" because I saw it on somebody's blog.

David, now that you've designated my response as the correct answer, do I win sumpthin like an apples iPod?

I'd like to answer the question, but first I need to make an apples to apples comparison...

Ok, so I lost my connection before I could put in the solution as the first comment. As a consequence, it's the third comment. Nice, Scott! (And nice try, Bill K.)

Err, actually, that would be "an apples-" because it needs a hyphen being that it's modifying a noun and direct object:

"an apples-to-apples comparison."

I don't see it working any other way.

Hey, change the rules after the game has already started why doncha?

Talk about capriciousness.

Hey, Jeneane, you go girl.

Hyphenation is a style issue. There's no requirement in standard written English that hyphens be used to connect elements of an adjectival phrase.

Elements of Style and Chicago Manual of Style are about recommended styles, but they're not exclusive of other, less pleasant ways of spelling and punctuating. It's not French or German! (Which do have standards bodies, as it were.)

Punctuation in general is a style issue, as long as you maintain consistency. However, it bothers me every time I see a NY Times article refer to "R.S.S."

AP Style suggests using hyphens to connect compound modifiers, but I don't think there's any confusion with "apples to apples comparison." This phrase sounds like an off the cuff remark a speaker would throw in to gain some time to come up with a better metaphor. I wouldn't expect to see such a worn out phrase in a written piece.

Someone chided Churchill about using a preposition to end a sentence, and he responded with something to the effect, "That's the type of pedantry up with which I will not put."

Well Jeneane's Elephants of Style is a stickler for proper usage, and dictates that compound modifiers require hypenation.

Correctly:

That's an apples-to-apples comparison.
OR
You're comparing apples to apples.

And yah, probably better metaphors around to use, but now we're talking apples and oranges.

David, any chance that some time in the future we'll see a blockbuster novel and movie by the name of The da Weinberger Code?

Personally, I would have hyphenated a la Jeneane. But then the puzzle wouldn't have worked.

Good puzzle... even if it did have a Style Bug.

Nice correction Jeneane. I learned something... once again. I don't really know how to write well.

I write like I play the piano... without much training but with love for the act. I'm thankful that my dozen or so readers don't expect much from me w.r.t. proper Style.

Still one can learn from observing their betters.

Poet 'an apples' signs her poems in lower case and only uses one n in her first name. Her most famous work is:

an apples' "to apple's comparison"
(a toast in two halves)

McD

"Can you find a meaningful, non-weird English sentence that contains the two consecutive words "an apples" [...]?"

By asking me to find something, you're basically making it a search problem. By quoting the string you're looking for, you're making things even easier for me, because now all I have to do is select the string, right-click (hyphen!), and select "Search the web for ""an apples""".

(Now there's a meaningful, non-weird English sentence with three consequetive quote-marks. Boo! Hiss!)

The first link up with which Google comes is meaningful, non-weird, and arguably English; it is merely spelled incorrectly.

"An apples-to-apples comparison" is fourth, followed close on its heels by "an apples-to-oranges comparison".

We then need to prune the word "comparison" from our search results to make any headway. The next meaningful hit is from the Inform Designer's Manual, written by Graham Nelson. But his string "choose row with an apples column of", though meaningful, non-weird and seemingly English, is in fact a statement in the Inform programming language.

But would you always capitalize or quote column names, or tags? If so, could you use similar reasoning to state that apples-to-apples should always be hyphenated or quoted? And what does "an apples-to-anvils exercise" mean? (At this point I got tired sifting through the search results.)