There are many tricks to turning dull, ineffective copy into words that work pretty hard, but this is one of my favourites: don’t be a piggy; be a sheep.
Piggy copy sounds like this: We! We! We! We! We!
Sheep copy sounds like this: You! You! You! You! You!
Here’s a quick example:
Piggy copy: [...]
Anyone can play the notes. I work on the pauses. Vladamir Horowitz (Paraphrased from memory.)
People tell me all the time how much they hate commas. Some say commas are overused; others say they’re not used enough. Nobody can agree on the serial comma. Everyone says the rules are confusing And lawyers in particular find them [...]
There are three distinct phases to proofreading process:
1. Just hurry up, will ya? Why is this taking so long?
2. You hack! An error got through!
3. Announcement: There will be a noontime hanging of the writer/proofreader. (Bring the kids!)
It’s true that by the time a document gets to the final stages, everyone involved is impatient to just be [...]
We’ve all got a language pet peeve. Some of us cringe when we hear “irregardless,” others wince when someone says “myriad of.”
My father pounced at anyone who said “at this point in time” and was especially vexed when “presently” was used to mean “currently.” Dad stuck by the old-school meaning of presently (“after a short [...]
Ever since I was a little kid, I’ve dreamed of the day when I would publish a book. An important book. A timeless book. A book that would change people’s lives. Something right up there with “Are You There God, It’s Me Margaret?”
Sadly, I am completely incapable of coming up with plots and [...]
Back in my good-old Bi-Hi days I had a grammar teacher named Mr. Dockrill. If you had him too, you know he was a terror. His exacting standards combined with his temper practically gave me ulcers at a very tender age.
I’m not complaining about him. In fact, he’s one of my favourite teachers of all [...]