Editrix

Good Punctuation Transcends Politics

Since Mr. K-- is busy grading finals tonight and doesn't have time to watch Dexter on Chinese YouTube with me, I've been keeping myself entertained by toodling around Slate. I came across this (admittedly old) article in which Bruce Reed mentions Supreme Court Judge John Roberts's passion for punctuation.

As proof, Yale professor Akhil Amar points to one line from a recent Roberts opinion: "The state did—nothing." Amar tells Greenhouse, "That little dash is brilliant."

I have to agree with Mr. Amar. Although I might have gone for ellipses instead, that's still a damn good em dash.

The En Dash's Demise?

I’m reading The Subversive Copy Editor by Carol Fisher Saller, the editor in charge of Chicago’s online Q&A. When I came across this (oddly reassuring) proof that even the Chicago goddesses have to go with the flow sometimes, I knew I had to blab it to the world. Be that as it may, what’s this business about whacking the en dash?

The style guidelines in Chicago have accumulated over the years according to their popularity and usefulness in scholarly writing. They change from one edition to the next when they are no longer helpful. In the last edition, we decided to give up on the “9 January 1930” style and write dates the way more Americans do: January 9, 1930. We put the n back in “2nd.” In the edition before that, in a matter where style intrudes upon grammar, we flirted shamelessly with using “their” as a nonsexist pronoun in singular contexts: everyone should hold on to their hats. (We aren’t proud of that little indiscretion. Even then, we relegated it to a footnote in small type.) We constantly argue over whether to kill off the en dash.

Please, God, no! It was bad enough when Ilene Chaiken killed off Dana! Don’t take away my en dash, too!

Fox News Makes a Spelling Gafe. I Mean, "Gaffe."

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Fox News Reports Joe Biden's Gaffe

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This Has Nothing to Do with Grammar, But . . .

I have a confession to make.

I think I am -- I mean, I think I might be -- starting to [whispers] like Sarah Palin. Not that I'm going to vote for her. God, no! And I certainly don't agree with anything she stands for politically. But . . . damn it, she raised the roof. She raised the roof.

P.S.: Amy Poehler, will you marry me?

The Peoples' Candidate

I'm not a Larry King fan (which isn't to say I dislike the guy -- I just don't watch his show), but I love me some Chris Rock, so I enjoyed reading this transcript of Mr. Rock's appearance on Larry King Live. However, the way CNN made the word people possessive killed my buzz:

ROCK: But this guy [Obama] seems to be a little bit more. He seems to have watched other peoples' mistakes and, you know, seems to have a little bit more going on.

P.S.: Please pardon my sporadic posting this week. I have resorted to poor blogging so as to keep up with my demands at work, where every document seems to come due at once, and where every e-mail has a red "urgent" exclamation point next to the subject line. Last night I had a dream that I was at a picnic with my co-workers, including my boss. In this dream, one of the project managers took out a document I'd edited for him and started enumerating the increasingly ridiculous typos I'd missed (e.g., saying eel instead of lens). I woke up in a panic.

"Frak"

The word, created by Battlestar Galactica and called "pure genius" by Dilbert creator Scott Adams, is covered in CNN. The report states:

It was [Glen A.] Larson who first used the faux curse word "frak" in the original "Battlestar Galactica." The word was mostly overlooked back in the '70s series but is working its way into popular vocabulary as SciFi's modern update winds down production.

But I know I've been hearing people say frak for a while now, and this blog commented on the word way back in 2006. Way to arrive late to the party, mainstream media. What's next? A story about how dungarees are catching on?

5 Questions with Sarah Haskins

Sarah Haskins is a frequent contributor on Current TV. She stars in Target Women.

Q: What is your preferred environment for writing?

A: I like to imagine myself at a desk in a sunny room, in the country, with a cup of coffee and a sense of peace. This has never happened. So, I can usually focus and write most anyplace as long as I have a good idea.

Q: What punctuation mark are you fondest of?

A: I like them all. They need each other to survive. As Paul put it in the first letter to the Corinthians, “And the period cannot say unto the comma, I have no need of thee: nor again the comma to the question mark, I have no need of you.” Paul wrote very detailed letters.

Q: What punctuation, style, grammar, or usage error annoys you the most?

A: Leaving out apostrophes in e-mails and text messages as in “im cool.” Or “hows it going?” Why? Why do that? How much time does it save you?

Q: If you weren't in your current line of work, what would you be doing instead?

A: Teaching English. When I was a kid I hoped that one day I would open a door to a magical world and have a great adventure. Still waiting on that.

Q: What drove you to write?

A: I don’t know – my best guess would be because I love to read.

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One More Reason to Be Jealous of Ellen DeGeneres

According to Yahoo! News (via Us Magazine), Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi are going to get married this Saturday.

Now, first off, congrats! I've loved Ms. DeGeneres since high school, when I first caught her "phone call to God" routine on TV. And I've loved Ms. de Rossi (pictured, in her favorite T-shirt) since I saw her on Arrested Development a few years back. Since then, she's been one of my desert-island picks, along with Salma Hayek and Lauren Bacall circa 1945, but I digress.

But what's up with this sentence, taken from the Yahoo! News article:

Following the California Supreme Court's monumental ruling that same sex couple's have the "right to marry," DeGeneres announced she planned to wed her longtime girlfriend on a taping of her show in May.

The first time I read it, I thought it was saying the two of them would get married on her show—like, before a live audience. And I immediately started making plans. (Holy hell! What time does Ellen come on? Who can TiVo it for me?) But then I noticed the "in May" bit and had to backtrack. (Wait. Weren't they getting married this weekend?) And then I realized what the sentence was really supposed to mean: Ms. DeGeneres announced on her show that she planned to marry Ms. de Rossi.

Way to disappoint, misplaced modifier. Jesus. I was ready to buy some celebratory cupcakes.

P.S.: Come to think of it, why is right to marry in quotes? Please tell me those aren't don't-blame-us, "we're not saying they have the right to marry" quotes. And why isn't same sex hyphenated? OK, I need to stop staring at that sentence. It's killing my lesbian-wedding buzz.

That BitchChristine Took My GreenSweater!

I'm a fan of the closed-up spelling of healthcare. I accept coworker, even though it makes me think "cow worker." I've made peace with copyediting, and if cell phone officially became cellphone, I wouldn't complain. But RiderCourse? (See the very end of this video.)

This oneword trend is gettingridiculous.

P.S.: I had to watch this video during a safety meeting yesterday. (We have them weekly.) Do you know how hard it was to keep a straight face when one of the vaguely multicultural daughters yelled, "Mom, Christine took my green sweater again"? First I thought of that Cosby Show episode (with cat fight [catfight?]!) where Vanessa stole one of Denise's sweaters (funny). Then I thought of the training video the Wernham Hogg folks had to watch in my favorite episode of The Office (funnier). Then I thought of the caring-for-books training video I had to watch during one of my stints as a library assistant (funniest). I'd post it here, but I can't find it online, which is unfortunate: it involved a Big Scary Tornado, a Big Scary Hurricane, and a Vermin Infestation. If someone knows of a website devoted to unintentionally hilarious training videos, please send the link my way (or should that be "myway"?).