To clumsily split the infinitive, or not?

I suppose if that were the only question then people would have far less to worry about in their lives.  I worked on Friday morning and when I walked into the store at 5AM I first realized that the floor hadn’t been swept, and then I took note of the ten-cent trivia question.  The question was written in Kate’s font, and had obviously been chosen from the stack of Trivial Pursuit cards by Ben.  Beneath the COD* magnets, the words challenged, “What part of speech is often used to clumsily split the infinitive?”  I, of course, was elated: a geeky grammar question that would no doubt be too challenging or foreign for most of our customers to even attempt.

My feeling of grammatical superiority was not thwarted by anyone who walked through our doors that day; only one customer took time to both understand the question and to provide a correct answer–and with no desire for a dime, even!  The nine year-old in her Catholic school uniform restored hope in my world as she approached the counter, motioned toward the sign boasting its trivial superiority, and said, “It’s an adverb, right?”

 Praise be!  There is something [else] redeeming about the Catholic church!  I guess I’ll just keep my mouth shut and make the lattes.

*Coffee of the Day