Tag: grammar

All for Naught?

Remember that book I was reading with the atrocious grammar?  I finally finished it.

I’d picked the book Heroes & Ghosts, specifically because it had 535 pages (nearly twice the number of pages these types of books usually have) so that I’d need to read only one more book—and a short one at that.  After reading the book, I had read a total of 4837 pages.  Which meant I had to read only 163 more pages to finish the challenge. Yay!

Notice the use of the past tense there?  Yeah.  That’s because when I moved around the gameboard (see pic) after rolling the die, I went the wrong way.

Continue reading “All for Naught?” →

Opps!

That’s how I spelled “oops” for many years.  I recently came across it again when reading a self-published book, and had to laugh.  The book has hundreds of errors, including my #1 pet peeve, then for than.  But in this case the author also consistently uses than for then.  And for added measure, the notorious effect when she meant affect.  It’s obvious she’s not a great grammarian because she also misused apostrophes and commas ad nauseam.  Apparently she had no beta readers.

Anyway, all that is a prologue to say that “Oops, I forgot to post on Sunday.”  As for Saturday, I didn’t forget.  I knew I missed the day.

So, three.  Three days of consecutive blog posts.  I suppose the next goal is four consecutive days.

Sunday Seven: Grammar Lessons

The English language provides endless opportunities to misuse grammar.I like to think I’m a pretty good writer, but I have my idiosyncrasies.  I begin too many sentences with conjunctions,  I overuse parentheses and commas, and I probably misuse semicolons, em-dashes and ellipses.  I blame my piss-poor capitalization on my years in the U.S. Navy.

If you look at any of the myriad of grammar sites around the web, there are a hell of a lot of rules.  In the first grammar post I started (but never finished), I used the term “bad grammar.”  Was that the correct term?  I researched and discovered there are thousands of pages of discussion and disagreement, with an equal number of self-proclaimed grammar experts.  (I’m not talking about English teachers.  I mean folks like me.)

Some grammar rules are very complex.  Even as a fairly educated person with a reasonable grasp of the English language, I have difficulty understanding them—let alone using them.  Since the rules are so many and varied, let’s start at the macro level.  Here are:

Seven Grammar Sites Worthy of Further Investigation
(with snarky commentary)

[Caveat:  Some of these websites may not be completely accurate.  In the past, I’ve found grammar articles with poor—or bad—grammar.]
[Caveat #2:  There are punctuation and capitalization rules for lists, many (all?) of which I may not have followed.]

  1. Grammar rules everyone should follow.  Why doesn’t every word in the title begin with a capital letter?  Is this a new rule?  Like Pluto no longer being a planet?
  2. 7 grammar rules you really should pay attention to.  Ditto above. Not to mention starting with “7” vs. “Seven.”  (It is ok to end with a preposition.)
  3. Grammarbook.com.  Hey!  There’s even a caveat stating grammar rules vary!  😀
  4. Grammarly Handbook. Even though “grammarly” isn’t a real word.  But Grammarly is a great website.
  5. 2o Common Grammar Mistakes That (Almost) Everyone Makes. Hmm, should the word “that” be capitalized?  Or even used?
  6. Grammar at the Purdue Online Writing Guide (OWL).  Go Big Ten!  (Even though it now consists of 12 teams.  My father would be turning in his grave if he hadn’t been cremated.)
  7. Top Ten Grammar Myths.  At least here “ten” means 10.  😉

Have at it, grammarphiles!  Depending on the direction this blog goes, we may delve further into the nuances of the English language.  I might learn something along the way, which always makes for a good day.