Tuesday, May 23, 2006

Breakfast SPECIAI

Nothing SPECIAI about breakfast in Park Slope, Brooklyn, except when it's at the Grand Canyon, and it's served with a side of improperly used lowercase L's. This is another perfect example, in which the only lowercase letter is the L, and it is the same height as all the other letters in the word, including an uppercase i. You can see that the author clearly knows how to use an uppercase L, as in the LUNCH SPECIAL, but he ends up scribbling some sort of hybrid upper-lowercase L for the DINNER SPECIAl.

Interestingly, when I first noticed this sign in passing, it was clean and unmarked by smudges. But by the time I returned with my buddy Berger and his camera, apparently someone kicked the sign in the upper left corner, undoubtedly outraged by the lowercase L. Either that or the Coffe & Jucie.

Friday, May 05, 2006

PlAYBOY

I caught this softcore lowercase L in a hidden camera clip from PlAYBOY TV, hosted on Break.com. While the y's are also lowercase, the lowercase L still looks slightly off between the other uppercase letters, and for a second I did think it was an uppercase i. The video clip is pretty funny, too, so click here to watch it. (Warning, brief lowercase L, not safe for work.)

Wednesday, May 03, 2006

PlEASE Serve Yourself

Fellow blogger mdx found this sign on Portland blog Potato Gun. According to the post, if you want to buy some fruit at this produce stand, you calculate your own tab and just leave some money in the box. It's all about trust, which is ironic, considering I find it hard to trust anyone who spells PlEASE with the offending lowercase L, not once, but twice in the same sign.

The word PlEASE is fast becoming the most popular observed and noted violation in the lowercase L world. Perhaps this is due to the fact that, when people write signs, they are generally trying to be polite, so they use the word PlEASE a lot. Anyhow, I've posted the photo to the left as an example of a lowercase L sighting that does not truly qualify as an offense. Observe that, while all the letters are uppercase except for the lowercase L, the L stands taller than the rest of the letters, and is therefore unlikely to be confused with an uppercase i.

So from now on, all qualifying lowercase L's should be roughly the same height as their surrounding uppercase letters. Like mdx's find, which is perfect.