Pursuing Pop-up Prepositions

“I don’t know where to begin,” Dis Connect complained to Grammar Smith.

He pointed to a stack of warrants on his desk.

“What are those about?” Grammar asked.

“They’re Over Exposure Warrants for a bunch of prepositions. I’m supposed to get them out of the sentences they keep popping up in where they shouldn’t.”

“Well, tell me what you have.”

“There are tons, but there are a few prepositions that are frequent offenders. Take of for instance. It tags along with off. Then it’s always shoving have out of the picture to hook up with could and should.”

“Yes, I’ve seen the trouble of can sometimes cause. What other problem prepositions do you have there?”

“To is another one that keeps butting in where it doesn’t belong. It seems to dog near and go a lot.”

“Hmmm,” Grammar mused. “That’s a bit tricky since to has to appear in verb infinitives. Can you give me an example of its straying ways?”

Dis frowned. “It mainly surfaces in questions. It shouldn’t be in ‘Where are you going to?’”

“Yes, that’s an offense that’s getting hard to overlook.”

“It’s when those prepositions slide in at the end for no good reason that gets me,” Dis said.

“Oh, yes! The worst is at,” Grammar agreed. “When I see or hear ‘Where are you at?’ I want to strangle someone. It’s worse than someone not turning their car alarm off all night.”

Dis nodded. “The best we can do is put them in handcuffs and keep them out of those sentences as much as possible.”

Just then, Wally Wordorder, head of the Fugitive Syntax Squad, ambled up to Dis’s desk.

“Ready to go?”

Dis stood up, gathering his equipment. “We’ll have to stop and get extra pairs of handcuffs.”