Communication or Communications Hardly a day goes by that I don’t see the following listed as requirements on a job description: candidate must possess good oral and written communications skills. But is it communication or communications. What’s wrong with that? Nothing is wrong with the requested requirement, but it should have read, candidate must possess…
The Importance of Punctuation Parentheses ( ) — and when to use them. I’m guessing most of you know the way to use parentheses, but you might be surprised at some of the rules, especially the ones about how to punctuate them. Let’s take a look. The importance of punctuation is…well, important. I know what…
Wordiness Communication is so important in today’s world, that I’m always puzzled by the terrible misuse of the language. Many people seem to go out of their way to make things sound complicated; in fact, the legal and insurance businesses do it on purpose, I’m sure. They fill their documents and contracts with wordiness so…
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Grammar Doesn’t Matter—or Does It? 17 Time-Consuming Words/Phrases That Make You Look Like An Ass (And, waste your time) There are a lot of people who like to sound intelligent, but at the same time the speak as if grammar doesn’t matter. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to sound intelligent, but they go about it…
Poisonous or Venomous? Sorry it has been so long between posts, but I had the unfortunate luck to have experienced two heart attacks and two strokes last year, and all within a few weeks. And no, they weren’t the result of a poisonous or venomous snake. It kept me in the hospital for four months,…
I’m Having A Very, Very, Very Bad Day Have you ever taken a hard look at the word very? I’m not talking about the use of very as an adjective, or even the use of very as an adverb meaning “truly” or “the actual fact”. I’m referring to the very we hear every day, many times a day—very…
One Last Lesson From Coffee Dog This is the third post I’ve done about Coffee Dog. The first was back in January, 2013. It was simply titled, Coffee Dog. The second one I wrote six months later. I called that one, A Lesson From Coffee Dog. Each of those posts were difficult to write due to the circumstances….
Building From Scratch to Develop Characters I was talking to an author last week about the writing process and she told me about a great character she had developed. I asked what role the character played in her book. She said, “I’m not using him in this book. I’m saving him for the next one….
What Do You Know About Your Characters Character development is the most important aspect of a novel. You might get a few arguments about this statement, but surely almost everyone will place the importance of characters at the first or second position. We’re not going to discuss how you develop your characters, but rather what…