Comments for Ask Copy Curmudgeon

Comment on I am a Bostonian by Jaime Sperling (@DiedofEnnui)

Jaime Sperling (@DiedofEnnui) — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 03:33:04 +0000

As a New Yorker who was here on Sept. 11, I have to say that I feel the sentiment outweighs the rankle. But I see what you mean – what if we say “I am a runner”? Which, of course, I am, but I like the idea that “we are all runners.”

Comment on I am a Bostonian by Tara

Tara — Tue, 16 Apr 2013 18:12:05 +0000

I hear the same rankle from fellow New Yorkers who lived here in September 2001. Your Monday was different from mine. I’m rooting for you.

Comment on My Copy Editor Confession by Jonathon Owen

Jonathon Owen — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 16:52:49 +0000

My first real editing job was for my university’s independent study program. Every course manual was supposed to have certain elements, one of which was an instructor introduction letter. One of my coworkers told the story of a time when the instructor failed to provide one, so she wrote a fake one for him as a joke to the proofreader. But then the whole thing was sent to the author for review.

Luckily, her fake letter was just silly and not overly offensive, and the author had a good sense of humor about it. Still, our boss was not amused, and my coworker probably wanted to crawl under a rock and die. Amazingly, she didn’t get fired for it.

On another occasion, I was making corrections to a math course manual that we’d already published, and I found the sentence “Editors rule” in the middle of a paragraph about algebra. No, editors. When you put jokes in live files, you don’t rule.

I’m glad I was able to learn that lesson early in my career and to learn it from others’ mistakes and not my own.

Comment on Test Your Mettle by Tom Slaiter

Tom Slaiter — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 12:34:52 +0000

Thanks for the post, I’ll be sure to refer to your presentation you gave at ACES, I like the idea of not having an answer sheet as a safety net.

Tom

Comment on Triage by End of the Line « Ask Copy Curmudgeon

End of the Line « Ask Copy Curmudgeon — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 16:22:36 +0000

[...] time is left before deadline, no matter how short that time is. Which is why we all have our mental triage lists—because sometimes you just won’t get everything done, and you have to know what to do [...]

Comment on Space Cadet by nikkolya

nikkolya — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 09:13:19 +0000

You also need to consider the audience. In certain U.S. military reports and documents (at least in the Navy) you are still to this day required to double space after periods (at the end of a sentence) and semi-colons. This is just the style they’ve held onto.

Comment on Space Cadet by Jonathon Owen

Jonathon Owen — Mon, 19 Nov 2012 18:05:22 +0000

I was taught to use two spaces when I took a typing class in eighth grade. It took me maybe a week or two to break the habit when the semester ended. I’ve never understood the fervor with which some people cling to their two spaces.

Comment on The Serial Comma by Space Cadet « Ask Copy Curmudgeon

Space Cadet « Ask Copy Curmudgeon — Mon, 19 Nov 2012 17:55:52 +0000

[...] going to say that seems a bit silly to me until I remembered how excited many editors get over the serial comma question, and then I decided to keep my mouth [...]

Comment on Like, Literally Literally by Ken

Ken — Sun, 18 Nov 2012 02:29:28 +0000

Excuse typo in above post. I meant “by”, not “buy”. Yikes!

Comment on Like, Literally Literally by Ken

Ken — Sun, 18 Nov 2012 01:10:16 +0000

Nice post. I’m with you that the language is losing something buy allowing “literally” to be used as an intensifer. I’m also aware that I have no problem with phrases like “he’s really hammered”, or “he’s truly hammered”, and nor, I’m pretty sure, do most people. Yet “really” and “truly” are – like “literally” – technically absolutes, used in this context as intensifiers.

English speakers use absolutes as intensifiers frequently – so much so, that it goes more or less unnoticed. The one exception that seems to get people riled is “literally”. But why should it be a special case? Not on the basis of logic or consistency. That leaves the “last bastion” argument, which I think is what you’re appealing to. It’s useful to have at least one word that literally means “literally”. I’ll certainly keep standing for it in my own writing and editing, but I’m not going to to go to war with people who feel differently.