Dear Internets, please learn to spell: #2- Laps vs. Lapse

I apologize in advance for the awkward pictures you will find herein.

This made me laugh, so I'll share how I came to decide on this spelling distinction today first:

(added after the rest of the post was written:  the sport I'm referring to below is American Football.  Don't worry, I'm not going to get into much detail about it)

I've been watching the Denver Broncos stumble their way through 7 wins in 8 games with controversial Tim Tebow (I'm from Colorado, so I gotta be a fan, right?)  Regardless of what we all think of him
(I personally think people hate on him too much - this is his first year playing 'for real' in the NFL, which other rookies have been doing better than him?), it's been really fun for me (and others) to watch (run-on sentences FTW).  Makes me almost grateful that the NBA started so late this year or I might of missed it.  heh

But, this isn't really about sports, so I'll stop jabbering about them.  I'm sure I've already lost many of you :-p

So, I've been reading lots of NFL blogs lately, especially pertaining to the Broncos.  Their comments make me laugh, lots of spelling errors, etc. Quite similar to the Wargaming comments on the big blogs out there.  Not surprisingly, a similar amount of dramatic disagreements about various things that don't warrant drama as well.  :)

However, there was a conversation on one blog that I can't find now to save my life (or I'd link you to it) about the "mental laps" that one of the players from an opposing team had today.  This spawned a somewhat humorous conversation between about five different people about the 'laps' he had, all of them using the incorrect spelling.

It was used so consistently that I thought that I might actually be wrong.  Ten seconds later, dictionary.com alleviated my fears. 

What they were attempting to spell was "lapse", which means something like "the failiure of something to happen, which normally does" (the dictionary.com version is the pedantic: "a temporary deviation from a previous standard")

The player who was being discussed was normally a good player, but messed up, and deviated (mentally) from what he would normally do in his situation.

The distinction, then:

Lapse:  the failure of something to happen, which normally does

Laps:  plural for 'lap'.  This could be used for swimming/running laps, or if there were multiple people whose laps were available for sitting on, or whatever.  lol

Or a cat who laps milk, as illustrated (quite creepily) by Batgirl.  heh

Having a mental lapse while spelling a word that in itself is 'fancy' enough to sound like you're smart seemed ironic to me.  Thought I'd share it.

Now off to start/finish my 10-page paper contrasting Yeats and Hardy, in the context of their poetry, with particular emphasis on the Sonnet.  :-p

(it's worth 30% of my grade, and instead of writing it, I'm talking about laps)

(or, in my case, a lapse in judgement)

(at least I know how to spell it)

(I'm honestly not sure why I keep using parentheses, but it's sort of creepy, so I'll stop)