Tag Archives: writing

Special Encore Presentation

Posted on August 7, 2009 by languageandgrammar

I love the special encore presentations when I see them on television. Not because I love yet another lame re-run but because I enjoy seeing television executives trying to make their lame re-runs seem like a special event. Inflated language … Continue reading →

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Conjunctive Adverbs—-or Adverbial Conjunctions

Posted on August 5, 2009 by languageandgrammar

A sign is hanging up at work: Empty the trash, then line the basket with a new bag. I saw the forecast for my local area: Rain will end this morning, then it will be partly sunny this afternoon. Both … Continue reading →

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Keep ’em Coming

Posted on August 3, 2009 by languageandgrammar

This is another installment of your pet peeves, which are pet peeves that you posted on our Pet Peeves page. Some of them might be redundancies, but I doubt they’re as redundant as the previous sentence. Keep ’em coming–we love … Continue reading →

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Comma with Because

Posted on July 30, 2009 by languageandgrammar

I often see writers and editors putting a comma before the word because, for example, This won’t surprise anyone who has known her for a long time, because she has always espoused both liberal and conservative perspectives. The problem with … Continue reading →

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Are You Killing the Apostrophe?

Posted on July 27, 2009 by languageandgrammar

Years ago, I came across a column on the demise of the apostrophe, called Are You Killing the Apostrophe. It makes no sense to me to discard a perfectly good and useful mark of punctuation simply because some people don’t … Continue reading →

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Tsunami is a Thrilling Prospect?

Posted on July 15, 2009 by languageandgrammar

Anytime I hear Quicksilver President and CEO Bob McNight say “A tsunami in surfing is a thrilling prospect, but the tsunami in business is terrifying” in an advertisement, I am shocked that something so stupid and insensitive is used as … Continue reading →

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Rarely Is Hardly Ever

Posted on July 6, 2009 by languageandgrammar

The rarely ever grammar goof is really just a hybrid of rarely and hardly ever, which both mean the same thing; thus, together, they create a type of redundancy. Use either rarely OR hardly ever, not rarely ever. I rarely … Continue reading →

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More Language Pet Peeves

Posted on July 5, 2009 by languageandgrammar

I always like to say that everyone has at least one pet peeve, and based on the number of comments that we’ve received on the Your Pet Peeves page, I’m obviously right! We’ve decided to occasionally highlight some of your … Continue reading →

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Is it Disorganized or Unorganized? What a Mess!

Posted on July 1, 2009 by languageandgrammar

A reader wrote to us to say that she’s heard, on several occasions, people in the media use the word unorganized when they should have used disorganized. If something  (or someONE) is a mess, thus creating a difficult situation, then … Continue reading →

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Yellowbook It

Posted on June 25, 2009 by languageandgrammar

I recently wrote a post about the expanding usage of google it (Googled It on Youtube), but now Yellowbook is actively trying to turn the name of its company into a verb by suggesting that people should yellowbook it when … Continue reading →

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