Let me ask you two simple questions: When somebody pays you a compliment, do you thank them? If somebody sends you a gift, do you send a thank-you note? Thank-you phone call? Thank-you e-mail? Chances are, if your mother raised you well, your answer to these two questions was, “Yes.” Because…
MM: Negating Negativity
I almost touched on this the other day when I was talking about a kinder, gentler form of writing, and then realized that it was perfect for today’s Mangled Monday. Double-Negatives make a positive. (Raise your hand if you learned this in 7th grade math class.) Let’s do the grammatical…
Weakness is Strength (Sometimes)
Sometimes, though, that’s exactly what you need. Who wants to be told what to do all the time? Who wants the writer to do all the work for them? I mean, sure, that’s the writer’s job, but you have to leave something for the reader to do, a journey to take–and they have to choose to do it. If you’re trying to persuade, or trying to teach or explain, you can’t just say, “This is the way it is. Period.” You need to let the reader discover that for themselves.
MM: Splitting Hairs
So, let’s think … So many writing misconceptions abound, which one should I address today? How about split infinitives? That one’s always fun. In grammatical-speak, an infinitive is the most basic form of a verb. To be. To run. To cry. To write. The traditional idea is that they should…
Typo? Or Not a Typo? That is the Question
We’re all human. We all make mistakes from time to time, typing “tot he” instead of “to the,” missing the Shift key when typing “I,” stuff like that. It happens. And those kind of errors are what make things like automatic spell-checks useful, instead of detrimental. These kinds of errors,…
MM: Compound Adjectives
Most of you should know what an adjective is, but what about a Compound-Adjective? This is an adjective created when two or more adjectives modify the same noun. Blue-gray paint Absent-minded professor Semi-solid food Sweet-and-Sour pork The idea is that the hyphen will help to avoid confusion. Otherwise, that tasty…
A Muse on Muses
So, here I sit in front of this blank screen. I had an idea in my head for a post, opened up the page to write it down, but . . . poof! It disappeared. All I can hope is that it will resurface in time to stand up and…
MM: You’re Kidding
Sadly, it’s true. There are still people who get confused about when to use “your” and when to use “you’re.” This one is really simple. If you want to say, “You are,” you write “you’re.” It’s a contraction of the two words. If you mean to denote possession, you want…
Independent Thinking
This picture pretty much says everything all by itself, but let’s be clear and explain it any way. My father was writing an e-mail this morning and this window popped up in his automatic “Spelling and Grammar Checker.” The program objected to the phrase,”This site will explain” because it felt…