How to Write, Right?

Sloppy language skills in “professional” writing is one of my biggest pet peeves. If you don’t care about reaching your audience with your message, why bother writing at all? Why lose your message in garbage?

The surest way of reaching your readers is COMMUNICATION! This requires skills that should have been learned in grade school. Learning the difference between sound-alike words and phrases should be paramount for someone who considers him or herself a writer. This cannot be stressed strongly enough!

I find myself being unable to enjoy reading as much as I once did because of the laziness of “writers” who can’t be bothered to have their manuscripts proofed by someone who knows proper grammar. It saddens me greatly, because reading has been the greatest pleasure I have known in my lifetime. Now I can’t finish a book without shaking my head in disbelief at the utter disregard for proper language skills.

PEOPLE! There are language aids all over the internet! LOOK IT UP before you “turn your manuscript into a publisher”. I cringe when I see something like this in a book that I would have otherwise enjoyed. There are thousands of young people who write incredible stories and publish them on Amazon or elsewhere before their manuscripts are ready to be read by the public. The enjoyment I would otherwise gain from reading them turns into frustration.

It isn’t so hard to learn proper gammar! Check these sites for lessons. Look up words! Learn how to use them!

http://dictionary.reference.com/

http://www.talkenglish.com/Grammar/Grammar.aspx

How I wish…

a / e

Affect or Effect?

This one has hazy borders. 

I always think of Affect as a verb and Effect as a noun. You may Affect the Effect, in which case the Effect will be Affected. 

Not to be confused at any time with Infect. 😉

Too Much – Too Little

There are ‘writers’ who lose their readers under an avalanche of words. When you are actually trying to send a message to your readers, be aware that they are not always impressed by your fluffy vocabulary. Getting straight to the point, with language that cannot be mistaken for anything other than what you intend to write, is the best way to achieve your goal. Big words may impress some readers while leaving others scratching their collective heads. You must decide who is to be your audience and write accordingly. This does not mean you need to write ‘down’ to the rest of us, only that you help us understand what you have to tell us. If your message is earnest and you have a burning desire to reach people, plain language is your best friend.

FBI Alert

Maybe I’m a bit off the rail with this, but I think it’s kinda funny.

Am I the only person who feels as if I am being tracked across the WWW? Does anyone else wonder if FaceBook has Investigators sneaking around peeking at our stuff? Did it shock you the first time you hit a site and they welcomed you like an old friend?

It’s not like I have a lot to hide, but I don’t like having my information available to anyone who has sense enough to type my name in a search window.  I mean, come on! I make typos on purpose sometimes! (And sometimes it’s an accident – a slip of the thumb. :D)

It blows my mind that I can create a post here on WordPress and have it go to several other blog sites, then have notices sent to my email inbox to tell me I’ve created posts on more than one of them! Don’t get me wrong, I love the internet. It’s just a little scary sometimes.

Just wanted to give all you FiBbers out there a heads-up on the FBI’s that may or may not be at war with Google!

Oh. And if anyone can tell me why they have the “Notes” app stuck on my Timeline, and what it’s purpose is, I’d greatly appreciate it. Might even send you a “Thank You” note!  😉

p-p-p

POOR – broke like me (without financial means)

PORE – an opening in the skin, or to study intently

POUR – tip from one container to another or somewhere else

?!,.

There is no such word as ‘alot’!

‘postrophreeze (Apostrophes)

If ya‘ll bear with me for a short moment, I’ll try to get y’all to see how the placement of an apostrophe can make the difference between being understood and bein’ silly.

Generally speaking, apostrophes are replacement marks for letters or a series of letters in a word or phrase. In other instances, they are used as a mark of possession or indicative of multiples.

“It’s” – The apostrophe replaces “i” in the phrase, “it is” or “it has”. (“Its” indicates that something belongs to It.)

“I’ll” become “ill” if you forget the apostrophe that changes the whole intent of the three letters.

“Ya’ll” – Texan for “You will”-

“Y’all” – Southern for “You all”.

“You’ns” – A Midwestern term that I have never been able to parse.

“Goin'” – American for “Going” – loosely associated with the “Gonna” of everyday slanguage.

“‘Cause” – Short for “Because” – as in “‘Cause I said so!”

Apostrophes after names or nouns indicate possession:

Tom’s name belongs to him. Dick and Harry’s names belong to them. *Note that Dick’s apostrophe is missing. He owns only his name, not both names.

Tom, Dick and Harry live in their parents’ garage apartment. *Note the apostrophe after the word “parents”? That is because they have two parents. Had it been only one parent, it would have read “parent’s” – as in belonging to one parent.

Sometimes the ‘postrophe is needed for clarification of multiple letters: S’s – esses, T’s – tees and others simply indicate multiplicity, not lisssping or s-st-stuttering.

If your smile’s on, you’re welcome to leave a comment. 😉

Whohoohooom!

“The typical usage guide statement about the choice between ‘Who’ and ‘Whom’ says that the choice must be determined by the grammar of the clause within which this pronoun occurs.”

Thank you, http://dictionary.reference.com/ !

‘Who’ will usually be the subject of a sentence. ‘Whom’ will usually be the object of a preposition. Hemingway may have been a bit awkward in his phrasing for the title of his novel, “For Whom the Bell Tolls”, but with a bit of rearranging, you may see how it works. The Bell Tolls for Whom? In this case, ‘whom’ is the object of the preposition ‘for’.

If you can replace either  with a name, it might help: Mary (who) is going. Mary is going WITH John (whom).

See? Not so hard is it?

Poor me!

pour – to tip a container enough to release whatever is inside

pore – small opening in a surface such as skin

poor – lacking richness

Sweat pours from the pores of poor working people.