I have been assailed by homophones wrongly used since my last story on this subject.

Several times recently I have read of a racing driver "breaking" too late for a corner. There have been many recorded occasions of motor cars breaking when pressure is applied to the middle pedal, but that pedal applies the brakes. The confused drivers were actually "braking" too late. There might well have been breakages as a result, but the action is braking.

Another mix-up I recorded was the confusion of phase with faze. A person was described as not being "phased" by some misfortune. To phase is either to carry out in gradual stages or to introduce or withdraw gradually. Neither of these meanings fitted the circumstances, but to faze, meaning to disturb or disconcert, most certainly did.

We have all seen examples of the unfortunate habit of some promoters of night-time activities to spell night as nite, but I recently found the word "site" used in place of "sight". You are now using your sight to look at my web site. The meanings of the words are not at all similar. Unfortunately, they sound the same.

In each case, except "nite", your computer's spell checker will not pick up the error if you substitute any of the words mentioned for the homophone. Perhaps this is the root of the problem. Too many of us rely on the spell checker to catch any errors we might make.

Sometimes the spell checker can help us to make an error. This can happen if we are using non-English words such as concours. My spell-checker told me to change it to "concourse". Which leads me to a very common error in newspaper and magazine stories about "concours d'elegance" for classic cars. Concours is the French word for a competition. A concourse is a large open area inside or in front of a public building or it can be, in a formal sense, a crowd of people. In other words, you can hold a concours on a concourse, but the two words should never be confused.

If you find all of this too confusing, do not despair. Help is at hand. Before you send out any written material from your office, give me a call and email the text to me. For a very reasonable charge, I shall edit your text, putting the brakes on errors of spelling and grammar, leaving you entirely unfazed if a pedantic reader should catch sight of your material.