Checking Up on the Dictionary

The reason "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing" is a cliché is because it's true. I was reminded of this yesterday when I saw a homemade door sign on a house yesterday that said (I'm not making this up) "No vendition." I'm not sure where the person who made the sign came up with the word "vendition," but it clearly wasn't the right one to keep vendors away.
 
The best I can assume is that someone speaking English as a second language found that word in a dictionary and figured it would get the message across. (In case you're wondering whether someone might have merely converted a Spanish word, there's no such Spanish word as vendición except as a common misspelling for bendición, which means "blessing.")
 
I must admit I've done the same thing on occasion — I don't know the word for what I want, so I look up a translation and use it. But as the above example shows, that's not always a good approach. Fortunately, these days there's an additional step you can take: Look up the word in a search engine such as Google or AlltheWeb and see how the word is used in real life. That simple step can give you an idea of when the word is used and what common connotations it may have.