Category: Grammar & Editing

August 8, 2017

Old Grammar Rules That Should’ve Died with Latin

A friend of mine sent me a link to Oxford Dictionaries’ “Can you end a sentence with a preposition?” a few weeks ago. Obviously, I wasn’t horribly curious to hear the answer (having only just read the article). And why not? I already knew the technical answer, and I still didn’t care if anyone ends a sentence with a preposition....

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January 10, 2017

The Most Common Colon Error Ever: Make It Stop!

The colon is one of those punctuation tools that people tell you not to use if you’re not sure how to use it correctly. One problem: people think they know how to use it when they don’t. Which leads to the most common colon error ever – and, no, I’m not being as dramatic as you think. I see this...

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January 5, 2017

Articles Are Important. Don’t Believe Me? Here Are 3 Examples to Prove It.

Articles: a, an, and the. Three little words that are often overlooked or outright dismissed, especially by math-minded people or people with English as their second language. No, really – I do a lot of editing for writers in both categories, and from experience, I can tell you that both definitely tend to skip articles. I’ll tell you the same thing I...

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December 31, 2016

7 Product Grammar Fails: The Tip of the Iceberg

Maybe, it was the 200th time I saw the pet adoption sticker above and wanted a red marker. Or it could’ve been all the advertising I see that ignores direct address rules. Like every sports ad ever. Whatever the reason, I found myself particularly aware of products with bad grammar this holiday season. Here are 7  product grammar fails that I...

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August 13, 2016

Grammar Humor to Brighten Your Weekend

Want to brighten your weekend? How about some grammar humor?  1. Are We There Yet? They get capitalization and punctuation leniency since it’s a pun (because puns naturally break a lot of those rules). Still, I’d be more tempted to buy the t-shirt from etsy if the capitalization were better…  2. Learn to Cut and Paste Kids See! See! Direct address matters! Using...

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June 9, 2016

Why Doesn’t Anyone Care About Split Infinitives?

You know it’s true. For all that high school Grammar & Composition teachers tried to drill it into us, nobody cares. I’m not even sure the teachers care outside the classroom. Even grammar nazis seem to shrug and look the other way. In case some of you care so little that you’ve already wiped the error from your mind, here’s...

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May 5, 2016

Is There an Author Who’s Submitted to a Publisher & Never Received a Single Rejection Letter?

I am seriously curious. Does anyone know if there is an author who’s submitted to a publisher and never – I mean NEVER – received a single rejection letter? I think if I submitted something and got accepted the first try I’d be tempted never to try again just to be able to say that (tempted only. I couldn’t resist...

Categories Business & Publishing/General Thoughts & Updates/Grammar & Editing Comments: 0

April 18, 2016

With Perfect Grammar, They Ask “Why Does Grammar Matter?”

Since I think a lot of you are word lovers, I may be preaching to the choir, but it scares me a little when people ask things like “Why does grammar matter?” If it’s an honest, innocent question, that’s fine (although it makes me sad for our education system). When it’s an objection like “But that’s not really important!” it drives me a little...

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April 17, 2016

Less v. Fewer: Finally! A Checkout Lane with Good Grammar!

I was so excited that the grammar was correct that I had to take a picture. Ridiculous? Yes. But so many stores get it wrong, that a sign that actually said “12 items or fewer” made my day! For the record, always use “fewer” with countable nouns: items, tables, shirts, cars, etc. If you can say, “1 car, 2 cars,...

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April 11, 2016

3 Words So Commonly Used Incorrectly That Most People Just Don’t Care

Sadly, there are far more than three. You know it. I know it. Let us remove our hats, bow our heads, and have a moment of silence for all the poor words so commonly used incorrectly. Ok. Moment of silence over. I picked these three words because they’ve been misused so much that the false definition is commonly accepted as...

Categories General Thoughts & Updates/Grammar & Editing/Quotes, Words, & Phrases Comments: 4