Wednesday, August 16, 2006
Writing Isn't All About Being Published OR Another View Of Why We Write
Even for those of us lucky enough to write for a living, writing isn’t always about putting something together for publication. That’s the way it is for me today. I spent the day at a children’s hospital (see my Life's Journeys blog), and that is weighing heavily on my mind. Writing about the...
Sign in to see full entry.
Monday, August 14, 2006
So . . . Just How Do You Feel About Going To Dentist Or A Hot Momma?
Here’s a revelation: We have a very nice word that’s hardly ever used. I’m eager for its reinstitution, for that will enrich the language. Know what it is yet? I’ll bet you do because it’s not a word you see every day, or hardly ever, for that matter, and I just used it. Most everyone else, however,...
Sign in to see full entry.
Friday, August 11, 2006
Profound Pronoun Perplexities Simplified In A Most Singular Manner
Here are those paragraphs again with the five pronoun errors, with the corrected version below them. INCORRECT: Fresh on the heels of their success with Run Before You Walk, the Jazwolf County Heart Walk Committee is taking up a new challenge. They want to inspire Jazwolf County to increase their...
Sign in to see full entry.
Wednesday, August 9, 2006
Profound Pronoun Perplexities To Ponder OR Make It A Singular, Please
The time has come to see if you have been paying attention, boys and girls. Today’s quiz deals with pronouns and making certain that they agree (singular or plural) with the nouns to which they refer. As I’ve told you before, these types of errors are common among amateur writers and even among the...
Sign in to see full entry.
Monday, August 7, 2006
You're In Trouble If Your Writing Includes This Error
I see this one often on Blogit, and, honestly, I’m not very hopeful that writing about it will help. This is an error that’s just too easy to make. Blame the apostrophe. If I had my way, we would eliminate it from the written language. That’s because most people misuse it rather than use it,...
Sign in to see full entry.
Thursday, August 3, 2006
The Most Unique Writing Tip That You Ever Will Read--- I Promise
So I lied. Nothing, not a writing tip, not a pizza with sweet and sour grasshoppers, not a politician with nothing to say, nothing, no matter how bizarre it is, can be the “most unique” or even “more unique” than something else. “Unique,” by definition, means one of a kind. So this tip can be...
Sign in to see full entry.
Wednesday, August 2, 2006
At This Point In Time, I Plead For Common Sense In Writing
More than 30 years ago, Nixon’s thugs did more than topple a president when they were caught wiretapping Democratic offices in the Watergate Building. During the hearings that followed, these criminal masterminds and professional politicians also made popular one of our language’s most idiotic---...
Sign in to see full entry.
Tuesday, August 1, 2006
Get Over It--- A Better Writing Through Repetition Encore Presentation
Here’s an easy one: When talking about amounts, write “more than,” instead of “over.” For example: “She won more than $3 million in the lottery.” “Over” refers to space, as in “the cow jumped over the moon.”
Sign in to see full entry.
Sunday, July 30, 2006
Indispensable Spelling Tip For All You Cheerleaders--- Encore Presentation
If you learn only one thing from my tips, it should be this: The word is “pompon” (with an “N”), not “pompom” (with an “M”). Yes, in some revisionist dictionaries that cater to the rabble you will see “pompom” as an accepted form, and sometimes you even will see it acceptable as two words. But for...
Sign in to see full entry.
Friday, July 28, 2006
Trading One Nuisance For Another--- An Encore Presentation
As Havelock Ellis once said, “What we call progress really is just exchanging one nuisance for another.” With cell phones, automated voice mail, and call waiting among my prime targets, I’m fearful of starting on a tirade of agreement with Havelock about that. But this blog is about writing, so I’ll...
Sign in to see full entry.
