Monthly Archives: September 2015

Paper Cuts

The daily paper serves as a living textbook on writing, but we all know that even the pros slip up once in a while. Here are a few gotchas from the past week. The sports page These two sentences appeared … Continue reading

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Don’t Stumble at the Start: The Sequel

In my first post one year ago, I talked about the downsides of starting sentences with “There is” or “There are” (http://www.normfriedman.com/blog/dont-stumble-at-the-start/). Now let’s look at another kind of less-than-optimal opening. To make my point, I’ll focus on what I … Continue reading

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“Like”

We have several reasons to beware of the word “like.” Let’s see why. Like 101 Given the overuse of this word in recent years, it’s obvious we aren’t going to impress anyone with sentences such as this: The movie was, … Continue reading

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Anniversary Month

Yep. If you are one of my original subscribers, you have now been receiving posts for a full year. And if you joined the party late, entries you missed are waiting for you in “Archives.” So let’s mark the one-year … Continue reading

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