My mom sent me this joke (have yet to see proof this is a true story) and it’s making its way around inboxes everywhere. Regardless, it makes me laugh. Some five-year old students are learning to read. Yesterday one of them pointed at a picture in a zoo book and said, “Look at this! It’s … Read more
OK, if this poll by British pollsters of YouGov is accurate — then prepare to cringe. The ten most hated words on the Internet — based on a poll of 2,091 adults — reports the following words making the list: 1. folksonomy 2. blogosphere 3. blog 4. netiquette 5. blook 6. webinar 7. vlog 8. … Read more
We’ve discussed apostrophes many times here, and we’re not going to stop anytime soon as long as the abuse continues. WikiHow’s How to Use Apostrophes mentions the frequent use of “photo’s” and it’s true. I know a few PTA parents who add an apostrophe in photos. I don’t understand why. It’s not as if it … Read more
Pick the Brain nicely abstracts George Orwell’s 5 Rules for Effective Writing and provides the link to the original essay. I just came across this tool that helps you eliminate cliches from your writing. This helps with Orwell’s first rule of avoiding the use of metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech that you’ve seen … Read more
Stop with the Overdone Modifiers On Writing Well taught me to cut the use of modifiers such as “really,” “very,” “so,” and “quite.” I save those for when I *really* mean something 🙂 It’s amazing how many articles I’ve edited that abused these words that they lose meaning. Using Only in Sentences “An Ode to … Read more
Thanks to poor Pluto’s recent declassification as a planet, the American Dialect Society — an organization founded in 1889 that “is dedicated to the study of the English language in North America, and of other languages, or dialects of other languages, influencing it or influenced by” — picked “plutoed” as its 2006 Word of the … Read more
Analyzing Eggcorns and Snowclones, and Challenging Strunk and White looks at Language Log, a blog covering linguistic boo boos. My kind of place. The article talks of eggcorns, “a type of slip of the ear in which people mishear a word and mispronounce it, then insist that the malapropism is correct.” Maybe I’m obtuse, but … Read more
That guy is hot! That guy is cool! Hot and cool are opposites, yet they mean the same thing when talking about that guy. My Polish grandmother is going to polish her silverware. Amazing what a difference a capital P makes. The knight rides at night in the rain and gets pneumonia. Here we go … Read more