I think I'll just have a bit of a lie-down

One of the disadvantages of being a pedant is that you are in constant danger of being toppled from the heights of pleasure to the depths of devastation.

Take reading, for example. There you are, immersed in a fine novel, loving the characters, shivering at every plot twist, in awe of the skill with which the words have been woven together, when suddenly the writer uses a word incorrectly.

This is an unspeakably cruel thing to do to a pedantic reader.

It's as though you were chewing on the most delicious caramel toffee and then you get to a layer of decaying rodent matter that coats your tongue with rancid bitterness.

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The joy evaporates, your teeth clench and even though the rest of the book might be superbly written and error-free (or the rest of the toffee perfectly delicious, once the offending shreds of ground-up rat-bone have been sucked off it) you just can't recapture that first flush of love.

This happened to me the other day. I won't tell you what book I was reading because I don't want to cultivate unfair bias against what was otherwise a nearly faultless novel.

However, about three-quarters of the way through the writer used the word "enervated" to describe a character in a state of extreme excitement.

No. People who jump up and down in a state of agitated ecstasy are not enervated. They are energised. To energise is to fill with energy, vitality or enthusiasm. To enervate is to suck all that good stuff right back out again.

When people are enervated, they feel physically and emotionally drained. They do not jog on the spot and punch the air in exhilaration. Mostly they just lie down.

Enervate is not a word one stumbles over every day, but I have noticed that at least half the time I see it, it is used incorrectly. This is not a case of a word being so commonly misused that it has become accepted in place of its opposite. Some dictionaries allow for the use of literally in place of figuratively and endemic instead of epidemic, but to use enervated when you mean energised is just plain wrong.

Some might say, so what? If it is obvious what the writer means, why froth at the temples if the wrong word is used? Fair point, but consider the feelings of those who suffer painful allergies to sloppy grammar. Spreading the word about enervate vs energise might make reading a safer occupation for pedants.

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There's an easy way to remember the difference, if we allow alternative spelling to enter the equation. In advertising, the Energizer Bunny is a famous pink rabbit that marches around beating a drum long after its band mates, who are powered by other types of batteries, have fallen over.

As an aside, the Duracell Bunny began beating its drum in Europe in 1973. The Energizer Bunny was born in the US in 1989. Fur flew.

The ensuing fight was temporarily settled in 1992 when the two companies agreed to split custody of the long-eared twins, provided neither crossed the Atlantic, but last year one of the critters got up the other's burrow again and the warren is still under dispute.

The Energizer Bunny - unstoppable, irrepressible, seizing the carrot every day - is the one we are interested in.

If there were an Enervator Bunny, it would not tap ceaselessly and annoyingly on the drum slung around its neck. It would slide down to the floor in a heap of sad pink bunny fur and refuse to get up again.

That's why the battery manufacturer is called Energizer and not Enervator. Not all commercial institutions are as wise, however. A quick search turned up three companies whose founders thought Enervator would be the perfect name to create excitement about their products. Guess where I won't be shopping?

• E-mail your observations on words and language to Sue de Groot on degroots@sundaytimes.co.za or follow her on Twitter: @deGrootS1