spelling

June 9, 2017

Friday Favorites for June

Happy Friday! Here are some of my recent favorite finds. Hope you enjoy them!

For anyone who is a spelling bee wannabe . . .

In honor of the Scripps National Spelling Bee last week, here’s a look at the most commonly misspelled words by state. I’m found Wisconsin’s error of choice particularly amusing. America’s Most Misspelled Words

For anyone who wants to read the classics but doesn’t have time . . .

If Oliver Twist has been on your to-read list for some time now, never fear: now you can get the ultra Cliffs Notes version in the form of an entertaining limerick. Classic Literature Limericks

For anyone who wants to do things “by the book” . . .

As I prepare for motherhood, I admit that I’ve been reading all sorts of books in an attempt to figure out the best strategies. But sometimes I need to step back and remember that there’s going to be an element of mystery and surprise in every big life change. This hysterical article compiles all the contradictory baby sleep advice in one place. I Read All the Baby Sleep Advice Books

For my fellow word lovers our there . . .

You might be surprised to discover that the most complicated word in the English language is only three letters long. The Most Complicated Word in English

For anyone in need of a dose of hope . . .

Professor Bruininks has studied hope for years, and her findings are at once fascinating and encouraging. “Fear and hope do not appear to be two sides of a coin but rather can occur together.” Why Even Pessimists Can Embrace Hope

September 24, 2014

Grammar Girl

I’m part of a writing group, and our assignment for last month was to write something funny. One of the suggested prompts was to imagine you woke up one day with a superpower. This superhero story is dedicated to all my fellow grammar geeks!

***

Surprisingly, it wasn’t the cape she noticed first, scratchy as it was around her neck. When she peeled her eyes open, the first thing she saw, as she did every morning, was the blasted orange sticker affixed to the skylight.

For “repairs” call 1-800-555-2369!

She glared at it, resenting its smarmy, illogical use of quotation marks. Do they mean the repairs will be ironic? She groaned, reaching for the pillow to cover her head. But before she could snooze for a few more minutes, she felt a tingle down her right arm, like a tiny electrical current. What was that? Did I sleep on my arm funny last night?

She looked at her outreached arm and noticed that her finger was pointing precisely in the direction of the offending sticker. She squinted at the orange rectangle more closely and gasped. The opening quotation mark had vanished! She pointed a tentative finger at the closing quotes, and it, too, evaporated, leaving behind no ink trace or grammatical scar.

She jumped out of bed, rubbing her eyes. Spying the Cheez-It box on the nightstand, she waved a hand in the direction of the cleverly misspelled Cheez. “Bam!” she said, and before her eyes, the z melted into se. Cheese-Its. Much better.

As she stared at her arm in wonder, she noticed a swirl of black behind her. Sure enough, she was wearing a cape—one with a gigantic cursive G in the center. In smaller letters underneath, the tagline read, “Saving the world, one comma at a time!”

Her phone beeped. She picked it up, annoyed to see that it was more spam.

UR eligible 4 a lower r8!

Her finger hovered over the Delete button, but then she paused. “Zing!” she cried, pointing a finger at the screen.

You are eligible for a lower rate!

She grinned smugly and got ready for work. Throughout the day she pointed her finger wherever she spotted grammatical violations. When she was stopped at an intersection, she changed the “Slow Children” sign to “Slow: Children.” When she passed the road-side market, she zapped the sign that read “Peach’s for sale,” sending the errant apostrophe into oblivion. At her desk, she scanned her e-mail messages for there/their/they’re confusion and affect/effect mix-ups. She reconjugated verbs, undangled modifiers, and eliminated all figurative uses of literally.

When she got home, she flopped down on the couch, exhausted but satisfied. Just as she put her feet up, she spotted a yellow envelope on the edge of the coffee table. She picked it up and saw her name on the front. What’s the occasion? She racked her brain, trying to figure out which holiday she’d overlooked. It’s not my birthday, not our anniversary . . .

She opened it up, and on the inside, in her husband’s unmistakable script, was this message:

Your beautiful.

She reached behind her head and removed her cape, setting it on the end of the couch. There were some things that not even Grammar Girl could improve upon. Or should that be “upon which not even Grammar Girl could improve”?

It didn’t matter. After all, there were some things even more important than proper grammar.

July 9, 2013

10 Grammar Saves in 10 Years

I’m not quite sure how I blinked and 10 years passed, but last month I woke up and realized it had been a whole decade since I jumped into the world of editing and publishing. It has been a good decade, and in honor of the mile marker, I thought I’d share with you 10 of the errors I’ve stopped from going into print over the past 10 years.

{Note: I have omitted the authors and titles of these books to protect the relevant parties, but rest assured, these are all real quotes from real books.}

My daddy was a steal worker, and my granddaddy was a steal worker.
[Sounds like a kind of shady business to me.]
Gelatins 2:16 clearly states that human deeds can never save us.
[Shockingly, the book of Gelatins made it through spell-check but not canonization.]
I was blessed by marring a Christian lady and having three kids.
[The blessing doesn’t quite sound mutual when you put it that way.]
As a society, we’ve developed an erroneous belief system that is about as subtle as a rattle snack.
[Hmm, must be a Southern delicacy, up there with fried okra.]
Joshua 2: Rehab helps the Israelite spies
[The earliest evidence of a successfully implemented 12-step program . . . ]
But the Pharisees hardened their hearts toward Jesus’ wisdom. . . . They planned to deny pubicly that he was Messiah.
[I have nothing further to say.]
This relationship is called “the hookup,” referring to repeated one nightstands.
[I’m getting a mental image of row after row of identical bedroom furniture. . . .]
Does that mean God wants us to never plop down on the coach?
[I’m not sure he addresses that particular issue, but it does sound rather uncomfortable for all parties.]
“You don’t realize that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blond and naked” (Revelation 3:17).
[Apparently, God prefers brunettes.]
From an endnote source: (Colorado Springs: Multnomah Boobs; 2009), 275.
[With apologies to the lovely people who work at Multnomah.]

“There are two typos of people in this world: those who can edit and those who can’t.” —Jarod Kintz

“Only Southerners have taken horsewhips and pistols to editors about the treatment or maltreatment of their manuscript. This—the actual pistols—was in the old days, of course, we no longer succumb to the impulse. But it is still there, within us.” —William Faulkner