I am so glad you decided to visit my blog. I promise you will find something new and fresh every week. During the course of this blog I will share with you writings from my soon to be published pocket book, Seven Rules and Ten Finger tips to Proper Grammar and Effective Sentence Structure--For Those Who Want To Get It Write!
The rules and tips were developed during the ten plus years I have taught college English Composition. I have a thirty-plus years writing career as a free-lance writer and photo-journalist. If you are so inclined, you can visit my website: http://www.lorags.com to peruse some of my most recent publications.
Before we really get into the write stuff, let me share with you my favorite and Number One Rule! You only get one chance to make a good first impression, after which you are either living up to it or living it down! You, are the one who decides which one it will be by the effort you put into making a good first impression. With that in mind, you have to be willing to think, re-think, write and re-write everything! You must be willing to leave it a couple of days and come back and look at it with fresh eyes. You must analyze every word, every comma, every period, and then come back days later and do it again, before you publish it!
The spoken word is sooner forgotten than the words you put in writing. Remember what you put in writing can come back to haunt and embarrass you forever!!! Just when you think you have lived it down, it will resurface for a whole new generation to see! Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a little, it might not be a whole new generation, but it could very well be the new boss or client you were hoping to impress. The moral of the story is, take the time to get it right before you write it down and publish it for the world to read! One day soon, I will share with you my personal story as to how I learned this lesson the hard way, and unfortunately, how it took me many years to live it down and re-present myself!
One of the wisest and most talented editors I know once told me that as a writer and journalist, words are your tools. He also said that in order to be a skilled craftsman, you need to be absolutely kowledgeable of and competent in using your tools. My take on this is, 'the first step in being a really great writer is to have a good command of the English language and to be a very accomplished speller.'
This brings me to Rule Number 2, if you are not absolutely sure how to spell a word and you don't have the time, skill or dictionary to look it up, use another word you absolute know how to spell. For example, it would be wonderful to describe a woman as being exquisite and breathtakingly beautiful; however, if you are not sure how to spell exquisite, breathtaking or even beautiful, and you don't have the time or resources to check the spelling, then just say the woman was "cute." I am sure you can spell C U T E! This will save you a great deal of embarrassment and help to foster a good first impression and mastering of your "tools."
I know most word processing software has spell check so there is little to worry about when writing; however, English is full of sound alikes and other words that make spelling and proper usage difficult. In many cases if you can't spell the word correctly, you can't check for the correct spelling in a dictionary. Being able to spell words phonetically sometimes does not help because there are words which are sight words, and they can't be spelled phonetically. In that case, you're pretty much in trouble if you don't remember what they look like.
Over the course of this blog, I will share with you other rules, tips, and techniques designed to help you with basis grammar, proper usage and ways to improve your writing, so plan now to join me each week for a cup of tea, or java, in The Write Suite. You will be glad you did.
Loretta
Before we really get into the write stuff, let me share with you my favorite and Number One Rule! You only get one chance to make a good first impression, after which you are either living up to it or living it down! You, are the one who decides which one it will be by the effort you put into making a good first impression. With that in mind, you have to be willing to think, re-think, write and re-write everything! You must be willing to leave it a couple of days and come back and look at it with fresh eyes. You must analyze every word, every comma, every period, and then come back days later and do it again, before you publish it!
The spoken word is sooner forgotten than the words you put in writing. Remember what you put in writing can come back to haunt and embarrass you forever!!! Just when you think you have lived it down, it will resurface for a whole new generation to see! Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a little, it might not be a whole new generation, but it could very well be the new boss or client you were hoping to impress. The moral of the story is, take the time to get it right before you write it down and publish it for the world to read! One day soon, I will share with you my personal story as to how I learned this lesson the hard way, and unfortunately, how it took me many years to live it down and re-present myself!
One of the wisest and most talented editors I know once told me that as a writer and journalist, words are your tools. He also said that in order to be a skilled craftsman, you need to be absolutely kowledgeable of and competent in using your tools. My take on this is, 'the first step in being a really great writer is to have a good command of the English language and to be a very accomplished speller.'
This brings me to Rule Number 2, if you are not absolutely sure how to spell a word and you don't have the time, skill or dictionary to look it up, use another word you absolute know how to spell. For example, it would be wonderful to describe a woman as being exquisite and breathtakingly beautiful; however, if you are not sure how to spell exquisite, breathtaking or even beautiful, and you don't have the time or resources to check the spelling, then just say the woman was "cute." I am sure you can spell C U T E! This will save you a great deal of embarrassment and help to foster a good first impression and mastering of your "tools."
I know most word processing software has spell check so there is little to worry about when writing; however, English is full of sound alikes and other words that make spelling and proper usage difficult. In many cases if you can't spell the word correctly, you can't check for the correct spelling in a dictionary. Being able to spell words phonetically sometimes does not help because there are words which are sight words, and they can't be spelled phonetically. In that case, you're pretty much in trouble if you don't remember what they look like.
Over the course of this blog, I will share with you other rules, tips, and techniques designed to help you with basis grammar, proper usage and ways to improve your writing, so plan now to join me each week for a cup of tea, or java, in The Write Suite. You will be glad you did.
Loretta
I hope you will follow me and learn uniques ways of English.
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