rationality out of thin air (and elsewhere)
STRUNKANDWHITEN IT! is named after William Strunk Jr and E.B. White, the authors of The Elements Of Style, arguably the single most important guide and reference book a writer in the English language can own.
Here are essays and articles on the use, misuse, and abuse of our lovely if baffling language in advertising, in newspapers, and on the internet. There are also pieces on spelling and grammar, and on constructing sentences and paragraphs.
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MORE BOOLSCHIDT “NEW USAGE” in writing! In several articles in what appears to be American English, I found writers had added a tilde (~) before an amount of money. For example, a sentence might read, “The cost of buying original copies of all six psychedelic albums by the Strawberry Watch Pipers in near-mint condition is ~$4,000.” [Read more] “who’s trying to replace a familiar word with a foreign accent mark?”
SEVERAL WORDS ARE MISUSED with great consistently—and often great dexterity—on the internet. “Moot” is one of them. Given that it can be used as a noun, a verb, and an adjective, it’s not surprising that users get things mixed up and become misusers and even abusers. While its use as an adjective is what I want to address here, I might as well give you the whole shebang. [Read more] “is the consistent misuse of “moot” is just a moo point anyway?”
IF YOU ARE GOING TO WRITE FOR PUBLICATION, you need access to at least one English language grammar and usage stylebook. No matter how good a writer you may be, no matter how much experience you may have, you will use that book frequently. (Unless you have a photographic memory). [Read more] “capitalizing articles and prepositions in your title”
I JUST PUT the finishing touches on a rewrite and update of an old article of mine on ’60s teen model Colleen Corby. While rereading the text and checking to see if the images were linked to their source, the opening sentence caught my attention. It read, “The term ‘supermodel’ didn’t exist when Colleen Corby was in her glory days during the 1960s.” [Read more] “the heyday in the blood is tame (and what is a heyday?)”
THE BIG BANG THEORY is an endlessly rewatchable show: aside from the fabulous characters and the intertwining of their personal lives, the dialog is chock-a-block full of humor of all sorts, from the zany to the kind that requires the viewer either have a reasonable IQ or access to the Internet to look things up. [Read more] “those fabulous furless geek brothers (rendered unimportant by recent events)”