The Daily News
1 The week sneaks away sometimes. Is today Thursday?
2 Memory Issues R Us. With a backwards R.
3 Ball girl in SD just booted one. She got right back up. What a trooper. What a pro.
4 Whaaaaaaa???????
5 I forgot to tell you that I began writing this last night.
6 This explains a lot about item 2.
7 The Padres have a guy named Gyorko. The "G" is pronounced like the "g" in the word geography. Kid had to be a fighter. I wonder if growing up kids called him Jerko? More than likely every day of his young life. It works phonetically.
8 How am I STILL watching baseball?
9 Gyorko didn't choke. He had a career night. For the record.
10 But it ain't over till it's over.
11 I hang on to summer for as long as I can nowadays.
12 Before I retired, before I hung up my cleats, before I rode off into the dusty sunset, I always saw the last week of summer as beginning on the Monday before the first meeting of the school year, usually the following Monday. I didn't even try to pretend that school wasn't looming. Earlier in my career I fought thoughts like that.
13 Not anymore. I realize the Giants are likely not going to the playoffs. In fact, everything turned into a blur this week so much that I had already thought they were were out of it. Then last night Jake Peavey gave us hope, sliding headlong into the bag to get a runner at first. My thoughts awakened, and a new Spring, a new beginning, a new horizon rumbled through the hills and valleys of the Bay Area.
14 No sooner did I think that when Jankowski drove in two runs, and the autumn fell silent.
15 Yeesh.
16 It's designed to break your heart.--- A. Bartlett Giamatti.
17 Said of baseball.
18 Sentimental old fluff.
19 It's also enough to make you believe in miracles.
20 And so we shall see.
21 We shall see.
22 Moving On, Part One: I didn't get a chance to see the Twincesses yesterday. I once again had chores to do at home. I missed those cuties. Just had LOTS of business to tackle and walks to take.
23 Took a long one yesterday through the neighborhood.
24 My Achilles got angry at me and reared it's
painful head. I sat down and iced it...I can't rid my mind of that ball game last night.
25 Posey looked amazing getting home on a wild pitch. Didn't help. Everything flipped.
26 Sorry. It's designed to break your heart. Isn't that where we were?
27 Dayum.
28 Yeesh. Let's move on, shall we? Or should you hear more? Nah. We got the Bums right where we want 'em.
Anybody lookin'?
29 Moving On, Part Two: Did you find the Warriner's grammar lesson helpful yesterday? It's fun, because, let's face it: nobody nowadays has this stuff mastered and I don't necessarily have to remain silent about it any longer.
30 They stopped teaching grammar with any seriousness in the 80's. By the 90's people began talking like village idiots. It enraged me. I kept teaching what I could, but education threw it all out: baby, bathwater, and tub. There is a little hope. You could go to Purdue's awesome sight. It's called the Owl. Click on the link, not the logo. It is just for looks.
Here:
Great resource. Not as goofy as mine, but an awesome writing place. Use it as you would a dictionary. Do the exercises. You were robbed. Listen: teach yourself grammar. Teach yourself grammar. I'll provide the sources. Teach yourself grammar.
31 I'm just trying to give you some of the straight-up best ways to approach this, and to master the language.
32 Yesterday we did Warriner's famous Glossary of Usage, almost the Moses' tablets on how not to talk, and how to talk, how to achieve correctness. You want your talking correctly to transfer itself to your writing correctly. Simple as that.
33 So allow me to roll out some other usage rules and defs for you. You pumped? Me too! Here ya go:
34 Some words sound the same but are spelled differently and have different definitions. Let us look at the accept/except sitch:
accept/except
Accept: Accept is a verb; it means "to receive."
MY EXAMPLE: I accepted a gift from my friend.
WARRINER'S EXAMPLE: Toby will accept the trophy from the principal.
Except: Except may either be a verb or a preposition.
Let's have a look (me):
Except as a verb: Except used as a verb means "to leave out." In the past form, it can often be used as "left out."
MY EXAMPLE: I don't like a lot of people, present company excepted.
WARRINER'S EXAMPLE: No one will be excepted from this assignment.
35 affect, effect Affect is usually a verb; it means "to influence."
WARRINER'S EXAMPLE: The tax increase does not affect my family.
MY EXAMPLE: Her inspirational talk affected his
performance in math.
Effect used as a verb means "to accomplish," or "to bring about."
WARRINER'S EXAMPLE: The antibiotic effected a cure immediately.
MY EXAMPLE: His fiery speech effected the revolution.
My Note: These are close. Google each used as verbs to get a feel for how they work, or if you are too confused, use a different verb! Duh.
Effect used as a noun means "the result of some action."
WARRINER'S EXAMPLE: The effect of the coach's pep talk was remarkable.
MY EXAMPLE: The effect of studying all night is often sleeping in class the following day.
36 Whew. You might go back and master those every few days. Here are some things that are MUCH easier!
37 All the farther, all the faster These expressions are used informally in some parts of the country to mean "as far as" and "as fast as." In formal English, as far as and as fast as are the correct expressions.
<use redneck accent when attempting the "Non-Standard" example by Warriner's following>:
NONSTANDARD: That is all the farther I can go.
STANDARD: That is as far as this bus can go.
ME: Dude. Just use as far as and as fast as. Period. Easy rule. If you hear someone use the others, don't judge. Just laugh inside, or you might even throw out a rude guffaw, but that would hardly be saintly, right?
38 Were many of you surprised by the no "s" rule at the end of the word "anyway?" It is never "anyways." That rule also applies for anywhere, everywhere, and nowhere. No "s" at the end.
MY EXAMPLE: I didn't see him anywheres.
Who DOES that? Easy rule.
39 being as, being that Use since or because.
My Note: NEVER use being as, being that, and I'll add my own: seeing that. Just don't. You'll sound like an idiot. I won't bother you with examples. Just change your ways if you've been doing that. No. Argh. Bleh. Okay I think I'm done withal.
40 That's enough for today.
41 If you analyze this brief lesson, you'll probably find the accept/except and affect, effect stuff the most confusing, and therefore the most boring. Stay on it; it's like mastering a song on piano. Work it over and over until it happens.
42 The other stuff is cake.
43 I might suggest reviewing all the rules and tips I've been presenting. And practice. Take time to practice. Hell, you're at a computer wasting away anyways.
44 Anybody lookin'?
45 <whisper: And...er...it's anyway. No "s." Oh, and NEVER use <slanted brackets, which I use all the time informally AND deliberately! You shouldn't or you might be JUDGED, JUDGED, Judged, judged until you silently slip away and go down a drain...
46 Thank goodness that I break every rule in the book, but I know which I can break. You might not, so until you have most of them down, master the rules I'm handing you.
47 And for gawd's sake, don't correct people who might get offended.
48 Good times.
49 I gottago.
50 I've mischief into which I must get.
51 Happy grammaring.
52 See you again.
53 Peace.
3 Ball girl in SD just booted one. She got right back up. What a trooper. What a pro.
4 Whaaaaaaa???????
5 I forgot to tell you that I began writing this last night.
6 This explains a lot about item 2.
7 The Padres have a guy named Gyorko. The "G" is pronounced like the "g" in the word geography. Kid had to be a fighter. I wonder if growing up kids called him Jerko? More than likely every day of his young life. It works phonetically.
8 How am I STILL watching baseball?
9 Gyorko didn't choke. He had a career night. For the record.
10 But it ain't over till it's over.
11 I hang on to summer for as long as I can nowadays.
12 Before I retired, before I hung up my cleats, before I rode off into the dusty sunset, I always saw the last week of summer as beginning on the Monday before the first meeting of the school year, usually the following Monday. I didn't even try to pretend that school wasn't looming. Earlier in my career I fought thoughts like that.
13 Not anymore. I realize the Giants are likely not going to the playoffs. In fact, everything turned into a blur this week so much that I had already thought they were were out of it. Then last night Jake Peavey gave us hope, sliding headlong into the bag to get a runner at first. My thoughts awakened, and a new Spring, a new beginning, a new horizon rumbled through the hills and valleys of the Bay Area.
14 No sooner did I think that when Jankowski drove in two runs, and the autumn fell silent.
15 Yeesh.
16 It's designed to break your heart.--- A. Bartlett Giamatti.
17 Said of baseball.
18 Sentimental old fluff.
19 It's also enough to make you believe in miracles.
20 And so we shall see.
21 We shall see.
22 Moving On, Part One: I didn't get a chance to see the Twincesses yesterday. I once again had chores to do at home. I missed those cuties. Just had LOTS of business to tackle and walks to take.
23 Took a long one yesterday through the neighborhood.
24 My Achilles got angry at me and reared it's
painful head. I sat down and iced it...I can't rid my mind of that ball game last night.
25 Posey looked amazing getting home on a wild pitch. Didn't help. Everything flipped.
26 Sorry. It's designed to break your heart. Isn't that where we were?
27 Dayum.
28 Yeesh. Let's move on, shall we? Or should you hear more? Nah. We got the Bums right where we want 'em.
Anybody lookin'?
29 Moving On, Part Two: Did you find the Warriner's grammar lesson helpful yesterday? It's fun, because, let's face it: nobody nowadays has this stuff mastered and I don't necessarily have to remain silent about it any longer.
30 They stopped teaching grammar with any seriousness in the 80's. By the 90's people began talking like village idiots. It enraged me. I kept teaching what I could, but education threw it all out: baby, bathwater, and tub. There is a little hope. You could go to Purdue's awesome sight. It's called the Owl. Click on the link, not the logo. It is just for looks.
Here:
Great resource. Not as goofy as mine, but an awesome writing place. Use it as you would a dictionary. Do the exercises. You were robbed. Listen: teach yourself grammar. Teach yourself grammar. I'll provide the sources. Teach yourself grammar.
31 I'm just trying to give you some of the straight-up best ways to approach this, and to master the language.
32 Yesterday we did Warriner's famous Glossary of Usage, almost the Moses' tablets on how not to talk, and how to talk, how to achieve correctness. You want your talking correctly to transfer itself to your writing correctly. Simple as that.
33 So allow me to roll out some other usage rules and defs for you. You pumped? Me too! Here ya go:
34 Some words sound the same but are spelled differently and have different definitions. Let us look at the accept/except sitch:
accept/except
Accept: Accept is a verb; it means "to receive."
MY EXAMPLE: I accepted a gift from my friend.
WARRINER'S EXAMPLE: Toby will accept the trophy from the principal.
Except: Except may either be a verb or a preposition.
Let's have a look (me):
Except as a verb: Except used as a verb means "to leave out." In the past form, it can often be used as "left out."
MY EXAMPLE: I don't like a lot of people, present company excepted.
WARRINER'S EXAMPLE: No one will be excepted from this assignment.
35 affect, effect Affect is usually a verb; it means "to influence."
WARRINER'S EXAMPLE: The tax increase does not affect my family.
MY EXAMPLE: Her inspirational talk affected his
performance in math.
Effect used as a verb means "to accomplish," or "to bring about."
WARRINER'S EXAMPLE: The antibiotic effected a cure immediately.
MY EXAMPLE: His fiery speech effected the revolution.
My Note: These are close. Google each used as verbs to get a feel for how they work, or if you are too confused, use a different verb! Duh.
Effect used as a noun means "the result of some action."
WARRINER'S EXAMPLE: The effect of the coach's pep talk was remarkable.
MY EXAMPLE: The effect of studying all night is often sleeping in class the following day.
36 Whew. You might go back and master those every few days. Here are some things that are MUCH easier!
37 All the farther, all the faster These expressions are used informally in some parts of the country to mean "as far as" and "as fast as." In formal English, as far as and as fast as are the correct expressions.
<use redneck accent when attempting the "Non-Standard" example by Warriner's following>:
NONSTANDARD: That is all the farther I can go.
STANDARD: That is as far as this bus can go.
ME: Dude. Just use as far as and as fast as. Period. Easy rule. If you hear someone use the others, don't judge. Just laugh inside, or you might even throw out a rude guffaw, but that would hardly be saintly, right?
38 Were many of you surprised by the no "s" rule at the end of the word "anyway?" It is never "anyways." That rule also applies for anywhere, everywhere, and nowhere. No "s" at the end.
MY EXAMPLE: I didn't see him anywheres.
Who DOES that? Easy rule.
39 being as, being that Use since or because.
My Note: NEVER use being as, being that, and I'll add my own: seeing that. Just don't. You'll sound like an idiot. I won't bother you with examples. Just change your ways if you've been doing that. No. Argh. Bleh. Okay I think I'm done withal.
40 That's enough for today.
41 If you analyze this brief lesson, you'll probably find the accept/except and affect, effect stuff the most confusing, and therefore the most boring. Stay on it; it's like mastering a song on piano. Work it over and over until it happens.
42 The other stuff is cake.
43 I might suggest reviewing all the rules and tips I've been presenting. And practice. Take time to practice. Hell, you're at a computer wasting away anyways.
44 Anybody lookin'?
45 <whisper: And...er...it's anyway. No "s." Oh, and NEVER use <slanted brackets, which I use all the time informally AND deliberately! You shouldn't or you might be JUDGED, JUDGED, Judged, judged until you silently slip away and go down a drain...
46 Thank goodness that I break every rule in the book, but I know which I can break. You might not, so until you have most of them down, master the rules I'm handing you.
47 And for gawd's sake, don't correct people who might get offended.
48 Good times.
49 I gottago.
50 I've mischief into which I must get.
51 Happy grammaring.
52 See you again.
53 Peace.
~H~
fin.
No comments:
Post a Comment