We're all wussies today. And I whine; you whine; he, she, it whines.
And writing these infantile stories? As chronicled before, it's a tough gig. Especially when it comes to grammar. I haven't seen the inside of a textbook since my abs were tighter than Dick's headband. And that, my amigos, was a long, long time ago. And old Dick doesn't even wear a hat these days. Ain't chic, hip or fashionable.
Now the dilemma Does a comma follow hip? [ in the last sentence of the last paragraph ] To comma or not to comma-that is the question. Back when I was trudging thru the snow to disembark at Rowdy High, a comma followed hip. But in 2004 the comma does not belong. [ someone correct me if I'm wrong ]
And I get perplexed in infantility when it comes to placing "because" or "since" in a sentence. And vexed when considering whether to use "to" or "from" as a preposition.
Many a night I've debated on the correct usage, normally choosing the wrong one. It's 50-50, you know.
And sometimes it's easy to misuse the verbs. You can use the past tense in the first half of the sentence and follow [ incorrectly ] with the present tense for the last half.
And take for instance Tea Leoni, star of "Family Man," recommended by yours truly a few nites ago. How do you get the little mark above the "e" in Tea? And Rene', pardon my freedom fries, what's the doo-hickey punctuation mark called at the end of the name?
It's too damn complicated and anal. No wonder foreigners have trouble grasping the language, as well as the average high-schooler.
There are forms of grammar that pique my curiosity and frustrate the hell out of me. And these are just a few for tonite-there are many more. But if breakup babe can handle the strain, then so can I.
Submitted for your perusal and approval:
Farewell and adieu, v.c.
P.S. Thanks to my good friend, the bbq man, who has helped inspire me through the years. And who enjoys reading The Pond. I appreciate the kind sentiments.
2 comments:
Hoots also swims the pond.
Okay, then, just because I love you, here is the result of a few minutes with Google:
***The comma issue was fresh in my mind, having run across the same question about a month ago. There is some difference of opinion about what grammarians call the "oxford comma." Here's a link:
http://www.askoxford.com/asktheexperts/faq/aboutother/oxfordcomma
***"because" & "since" seems to be a no-starter. Far as I can tell, do what feels good. I love it. Makes me feel like a kid in the sixties again. Here's a link:
http://home.comcast.net/~garbl/stylemanual/myths.htm#since
***That little thingy in Rene is called an accent acute (or as my French teacher would say, "AK-sawng a-GEW"). That, along with a raft of other special symbols can be found here:
http://www.danshort.com/HTMLentities/
The list gives the HTML tags if you are working in that format. Included are accent grave, accent acute, circumflex, tilde, umlaut or dieresis, ring, ligature and cedilla. [My preference is to use "and" at the end of a series with no comma. All those other commas were substituting for "and" so "and" preceded by a comma would be redundant, "and and". I think the oxford comma is used for conversational immitation or reading clarity when the rules might not otherwise call for a comma.]
The easy way to get one of those special symbols into your writing is to work in MS Word. From the toobar select "Insert". Drop down menu find "Symbols". There are two tabs, "Font" and "special characters." Each has a couple of drop-down field windows that will give you more shit than you will ever use. Highlight the one you like and select "Insert" at the bottom of the box. What ever you selected will go wherever you left the cursor, which in my case is sometimes way off somewhere that I forgot about, and I have to look it up all over again.
Hope this helps.
Thanks for the info, hoots. You have a knack for dotting the i's and crossing the t's. Have you thought about a career in accounting?
Another one that gives me pause is when to use "to" or "for." That one stumps the Pond quite a bit.Cos I'm so banal, er, anal. And try to get it just right.
v.c.
P.S. I edited the Piggly Wiggly foray. A minor glitch. It's in the first sentence. "We're all wussies today" was changed to "We're all wussies." Don't know where today came from but it shouldn't have been there. Late nite disclaimer, eh?
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