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National Punctuation Day Contest

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Editor’s Note: You’ll have fun participating in this contest for this year’s National Punctuation Day!

by Jeff Rubin, founder, National Punctuation Day

This year we celebrate National Punctuation Day with a punctuation photo contest. Here are the rules:

PREPARING THE PHOTOS
1. Take three photos of incorrectly punctuated signage (stores, billboards, businesses, road signs, public transit, etc.), each showing a different punctuation error. (See example photo.)
2. Name the punctuation error(s) in each photo (there may be multiple errors).
3. Submit one entry of three photos per person.
4. You must be in the photos (see me in the “Member’s Testimonials” photo below). Selfies are OK. Photos with photoshopped heads will be disqualified.
5. Each photo must contain a caption, which will be considered when judging your entry. Be creative.
6. Photos must be submitted in .JPG format and be no more than 2 MB each.
7. The file name for your photos must include your last name in CAPS. For example: RUBIN photo #1.jpg, RUBIN photo #2.jpg, etc.

SUBMITTING THE PHOTOS
1. Send your submission to jeff@NationalPunctuationDay.com.
2. In the e-mail subject header write: NPD PHOTO CONTEST.
3. Include your name, address, and location of the photos (city and state).

The deadline for submissions is OCTOBER 31, 2017.

Jeff points out punctuation blunder.

National Punctuation Day
www.NationalPunctuationDay.com

jeff@NationalPunctuationDay.com

 

The Versatile Semicolon

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by Barbara McNichol

In many of the memos and manuscripts memos I read, writers take a convoluted approach to punctuation. Especially, too many semicolons show up in too many wrong ways. How can you remember what’s right?

Every time you’re tempted to use a semicolon, review these three brief rules.

  1. Use a semicolon to separate two independent clauses. Independent means each clause has both a subject and verb. Even though each clause could stand alone as a separate sentence, the semicolon indicates a relationship between the two.

e.g., I need to upgrade my writing skills; embarrassing mistakes have been creeping in.

Note: Do not use both a semicolon and a conjunction to join two clauses—pick one or the other. e.g., I need to upgrade my writing skills; but embarrassing mistakes have been creeping in.

  1. Use a semicolon before a transitional adverb such as “therefore” or “however.”

e.g., The payment is overdue; therefore, we owe a penalty.

e.g., It’s been a long time since we met; however, it’s not too late.

Note: Use a comma after “therefore” and “however” in these cases.

  1. Use semicolons to separate items or elements in a list that contains one of more internal commas.

e.g., She traveled to Beijing, China; Paris, France; and London, England.

e.g., He believes three things: that every situation, no matter how grim, can be resolved; that no one needs to suffer, especially Mother Earth; and that people are inherently good.

Note: This sentence could improve if it were broken into two or more sentences. Easier to follow!

Get clear on these rules; I guarantee knowing them will simplify your writing!

Celebrate National Punctuation Day, September 24th

Summer Ends September 21st – So Does This Summer Sizzler Special!

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English language resourceTake this opportunity to have Word Tripper of the Week plus valuable  bonuses in your inbox—and save $50—while summer lasts! This $49 special expires September 21, so act soon. Go to Word Trippers Tips

This 52-week subscription resource to boost your writing skills and avoid writing blunders includes:

  • Word Tripper of the Week that clarifies a tricky word pair in your in-box each week for 52 weeks. It features an audio option so you can hear each Word Tripper, too. (See sample on this page.)
  • 38-minute “Strengthen Everything You Write” webinar explains how to  Whack Wordiness (write tight) and features Top Techniques that immediately sharpen your writing/self-editing skills (Week #4 MP3 download BONUS)
  • One Word or Two? is a popular reference for checking if a common word should be hyphenated or not. (Week #13 PDF download BONUS)
  • Proper Pronoun matrix pinpoints the correct pronoun to use in a sentence fast (Week #20 PDF download BONUS)
  • Punctuation Guide makes it fast and easy to know which punctuation to use when. (Week #39 PDF download BONUS)
  • Tag-Ons and Redundancies identifies redundant phrases to avoid at a glance. (Week #44 PDF download BONUS)
  • 2 Crossword Puzzles play with previous Word Trippers of the Week as a fun way to review what you’ve learned (Week #26 and Week #52 interactive BONUS)
  • Word Trippers ebook featuring 390+ pesky pairings of words that can trip you up (except vs. accept, advise vs. advice, further vs. farther, to name a few)

Don’t wait! Go now to www.WordTrippers.com.

NFAA Presents Its First Fall Nonfiction Writers Conference

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Nonfiction Authors Association presents its first-ever Fall Conference. It’s shorter than the annual conference held every spring, but comes loaded with value, content, and quality!

Marketing Mastery for Authors

Dates: November 10-11, 2017

Times: 9am PST / noon EST to 1pm PST / 4pm EST each day

Location: Your computer! This event is virtual.

Speakers

  • Jim Horan – Opening Keynote: Are You Ready for Your Author Business to Get Easy?
  • Sandra Beckwith – Build Your Book Marketing Plan
  • Connie Ragan Green – Website Secrets and Content Marketing for Authors
  • Joan Stewart – Book Hooks: Fun, Timely, Creative Angles to Publicize Your Book
  • Dennis Yu – Facebook Marketing for Authors
  • Stephanie Chandler – Advanced Book Marketing Tactics That Get Results
  • Patrick Schwerdtfeger – Keynote Gold: Speaking to Sell More Books
  • Tina Dietz – Marketing with Podcasts and Audio Books

Registration Bonus

Once you register, you will immediately receive instructions to download five of our most popular tools from our exclusive Author Toolkits:

  • Book Marketing Action Plan Template
  • Report: 100 Ways to Grow an Audience for Your Book
  • Report: 101 Essential Marketing Resources for Authors
  • Report: Online PR – How to Find and Pitch Internet Media Sources
  • Report: How to Build Your List of Media Contacts
  • Report: 50 Ways to Generate Book Reviews

Early Bird Discount

Save 40% off conference registration with this code: SAVE40NFWC

Expires 9/14/17

Can’t attend during the live sessions? Not to worry! Recordings and transcripts are available. Conference access starts at just $99. This is also a great time to join the Nonfiction Authors Association since you can take advantage of discounted conference access!

Register here

Satisfaction is always 100% guaranteed.

3 Worst Places to Make a Grammar Error

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Grammar ErrorBy Kathleen Watson (used with permission)

News headlines draw us into a story. Report titles summarize what our readers can expect. Email subject lines should do both. That’s why these are the three worst places to make a grammar error.

Here are three headlines that don’t pass a grammar test and how they could be better:

  1. Bill Nye Only Needs 10 Seconds To Explain The Toughest Science Theories

The problem: misplaced modifier

Modifiers are words that add meaning or clarification. The emphasis of this headline is the minimal amount of time Science Guy Bill Nye needs to explain complex science theories.

Modifiers should be placed close to—preferably next to—the words they modify.

The solution:

Bill Nye Needs Only 10 Seconds To Explain The Toughest Science Theories

  1. France’s Political Parties Are Banding Together To Stop Le Pen

The problem: redundancy

Not all sources agree but I consider banding together redundant.

My test for redundancy: Would the opposite descriptor—in this case banding apart instead of banding together—make sense? Do people ever band apart?

Of course not. So there’s no need to clarify that people—or political parties—band together.

As a verb, band is described this way: to unite in a troop; to come together in a group because of a common purpose or belief

Synonyms are to connect, to join, to unite, to merge.

The solution:

France’s Political Parties Unite To Stop Le Pen

  1. Stabbing At Flint Airport Deemed Potential Act Of Terrorism By FBI

The problem: This wording could be interpreted as the FBI having committed a potential act of terrorism.

The solution:

FBI Deems Flint Airport Stabbing Potential Act of Terrorism

FBI Deems Stabbing At Flint Airport Potential Act of Terrorism

News cycles rapidly, and writers are under pressure to publish stories in minimal time. Yet when I read these headlines, it took me just seconds to recognize better ways to compose them without a grammar error.

Whether you’re reporting the news, writing a title for a report, or crafting an email subject line, allow time to review what you’ve written. You’ll be more likely to catch these kinds of oversights that avoid detection when you write in haste.

If you see silly or questionable headlines, please note them here or send them to mailto:contact@ruthlesseditor.com

Kathleen calls herself the Ruthless Editor. She has created Grammar for People Who Hate Rules to help people write and speak with authority and confidence. Kathleen can be reached at kathy@ruthlesseditor.com.

Cluelessness or Sloppiness? Language Misuses Abound

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Editor’s note: This article struck a chord (not cord) with me and fans of Word Trippers. It offers numerous examples of written language misuses on television—networks that should know better! Be sure to leave your comments and examples below. (For a resource to find the right words fast, go to www.wordtrippers.com)

Reprinted from e-newsletter for Grammarbook.com

TV networks’ graphics departments have long been out of control with their intrusive cluelessness.

After 9/11, many cable channels initiated a constant “crawl” of news at the bottom of the screen. The spellbinding stream of words, slow and endless, is perversely distracting.

But if you run a news channel, shouldn’t credibility be a front-burner concern? Shaky language skills for all to see raise serious questions about your standards language misusesand practices. Are you stupid, or do you just think we are? Who put manic ignoramuses in charge of your graphics department?

The examples that follow all happened in recent months:

  • An ABC affiliate, thinking mischievous has four syllables, spelled it “mischievious.” Another ABC graphic said, “Wake Forrest,” then proved it was no fluke with “Angeles National Forrest.”
  • An NBC affiliate came up with “To good to be true.” We’re still taught about to, too, and two, aren’t we? Maybe it was Bring Your First-Grader to Work Day.
  • Fox fell into a common trap with “wrecking havoc”—the proper phrase is wreaking havoc. And Fox embarrassed itself with “embarassed.” In “alledged embassy bomber,” it earned an F by adding a second d to alleged. A superfluous ‘i’ in “How has the president faired?” meant fare thee well, credibility.
  • CNN joined the party with “theif” and “Iranian peoples’ belief.” Put that apostrophe where it belongs, would you? And CNN might have won the knucklehead sweepstakes with this bizarre bulletin: “Houses OKs climate change.” Where do you begin with that one? It’s an inspired fusion of horrid grammar and utter meaninglessness.

Why do TV networks, some of them scrutinized around the world, undermine themselves with sloppy grammar, spelling, and punctuation?

Please share your comments and examples of language misuses on TV.

An Editor’s Story and an Enticing Offer

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by Barbara McNichol

As a life-long editor who’s had a professional editing service for 23+ years, I frequently trip over embarrassing writing mistakes—e.g., “except” instead of “accept” or “complement” instead of “compliment” and hundreds more. Clearly, English is a tricky language!

The question I’ve asked for eons is “How can I help people avoid embarrassment and quickly find the correct word?” So I coined the Word Trippers model as a way to quickly distinguish between tricky words. Here’s an example:

Affirm, confirm – “Affirm” means to declare positively or firmly, to assert as true or factual, while “confirm” means to verify, make firmer, strengthen, support or establish validity. “Working on the campaign helped confirm my intention to go into politics,” he affirmed in his announcement speech.

I couldn’t stop! After creating an extensive resource featuring 390+ common Word Trippers, I sent out Word Tripper of the Week for 3+ years, and I featured Word Trippers in my WordShops.

Then it dawned on me. I could combine Word Tripper of the Week with proven writing techniques through an innovative subscription resource: Word Trippers Tips. At its first-year anniversary, I’m celebrating with a half-price Sizzling Summer Special designed for:

  • Business professionals
  • VAs and admin assistants
  • English language learners
  • Authors, bloggers, speakers
  • High school and college students
  • Grant writers, court reporters, journalists

Word Trippers Tips assists people who value accuracy in communication.

  • Saves you time looking up definitions
  • Establishes your credibility as a communicator
  • Helps avoid writing mistakes that lead to confusion
  • Assists in understanding the nuances of our language
  • Boosts your confidence by knowing the correct words

All these benefits are yours! Bring Word Trippers Tips and its multiple bonuses into your world for half the cost. This Sizzling Summer Special ends when summer does—September 21st.

Word Trippers Tips saves me a lot of research time because it gives me a quick reference instead of going to Google. I save every Word Tripper of the Week so when my boss or co-workers disagree on how to use a word, Word Trippers becomes the referee. All of us live on email. If someone sends me one that’s sloppily written, it’s like saying, “I don’t have time for you.” I want to be sure I write clearly and accurately. Word Trippers Tips is perfect for me! – Susan Powell, Team Lead, Ratner Companies

Word Tripper Tips—a 52-week subscription resource
Summer Sizzler Special $99  $49
www.WordTrippers.com

Mark Twain’s Sage Writing Advice

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by Chris Stern (reprinted from SSA newsletter)

Mark Twain was considered one of the greatest American writers of his time. He was often asked about the craft of writing and gave quite a bit of advice about putting words on paper. Here are a few of my favorites.

  1. Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please. Interestingly, this was quoted by Rudyard Kipling in From Sea to Sea (1899) with the attribution to Mark Twain.
  2. You need not expect to get your book right the first time. Go to work and revamp or rewrite it. God only exhibits his thunder and lightning at intervals, and so they always command attention. These are God’s adjectives. You thunder and lightning too much; the reader ceases to get under the bed, by and by. This was in a letter to his son Orion Clemens in March 1878.
  3. Use good grammar. Not exactly a bold insight, but one that he wrote regarding “Fennimore Cooper’s Literary Offences” in 1895. He wrote “18 Rules of Writing” in this article, the advice on good grammar was #14 . Here are a few more from this source:
  4. A tale shall accomplish something and arrive somewhere.
  5. The episodes of a tale shall be necessary parts of the tale, and shall help develop it.
  6. The personages in a tale shall be alive, except in the case of corpses, and that always the reader shall be able to tell the corpses from the others.
  7. The personages in a tale, both dead and alive, shall exhibit a sufficient excuse for being there.
  8. Eschew surplusage. (aka Whack Wordiness)
  9. The time to begin writing an article is when you have finished it to your satisfaction.
    By that time you begin to clearly and logically perceive what it is that you really want to say.
  10. Don’t say the old lady screamed. Bring her on and let her scream. (Barbara’s favorite)

Which of these are your favorites, either from a “funny” or a “serious” point of view?

Weekly Resource Helps You Avoid Writing Mistakes

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by Barbara McNichol

As a life-long editor who’s had a professional editing service for 23+ years, I frequently trip over embarrassing writing mistakes —e.g., “except” instead of “accept” or “complement” instead of “compliment” and hundreds more.

English is a tricky language!! The question I’ve asked for eons is “How can I help people avoid embarrassment and quickly find the correct word?”

Years ago, I coined the Word Trippers model as a way to quickly distinguish between tricky words. Here’s an example:

Affirm, confirm – “Affirm” means to declare positively or firmly, to assert as true or factual, while “confirm” means to verify, make firmer, strengthen, support or establish validity. “Working on the campaign helped confirm my intention to go into politics,” he affirmed in his announcement speech.

Then I just couldn’t stop! After creating an extensive resource featuring 390+ common Word Trippers, I sent out Word Tripper of the Week for 3+ years, and I featured Word Trippers in my WordShops.

Then it dawned on me. I could combine Word Tripper of the Week with top techniques to help people avoid writing mistakes through an innovative subscription resource: Word Trippers Tips. At its first-year anniversary, I’m celebrating with a half-price Sizzling Summer Special for:

  • Business professionals
  • VAs and admin assistants
  • English language learners
  • Authors, bloggers, speakers
  • High school and college students
  • Grant writers, court reporters, journalists

For individuals in these groups, Word Trippers Tips:

  • Helps avoid writing mistakes that create chaos
  • Establishes you as a credible communicator
  • Assists in learning English quickly and easily
  • Boosts your confidence in knowing the correct words

“Word Trippers Tips saves me a lot of research time because it gives me a quick reference instead of going to Google. I save every Word Tripper of the Week so when my boss or co-workers disagree on how to use a word, Word Trippers becomes the referee. All of us live on email. If someone sends me one that’s sloppily written, it’s like saying, ‘I don’t have time for you.’ I want to be sure I write clearly and accurately. Word Trippers Tips is perfect for me!” – Susan Powell, Team Lead, Ratner Companies

Word Trippers Tips logo-500ACTION: Check out the details of this skill-building resource and take advantage of a half-price special NOW.

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