Be Yourself!

Rumor has it that being a writer or any sort of artist (artiste if you want to be pretentious) gives you license to be quirky.

You can wear your hair short and spiky, and even dye it with purple streaks (if that's your thing). You can wear old tennis shoes with an otherwise hip outfit, including a trench coat and funky glasses. You can wear black socks with short pants and you can have LOTR marathons (extended edition, of course).

But hey, I say be yourself whether you're an artiste or an accountant. Even if that means wearing Spider Man undies under your three-piece suit.

Procrastination

It's 9:24 pm and I have a deadline tomorrow.

So I'm blogging.

I'm also watching Action Jackson and Flashy Ferrari do dog tricks on Oprah. And then there's Maggie the Jack Russell Terrier who can add, subtract, multiply and divide. Seriously.

Reminds me of college. My apartment was never cleaner than when I had an essay due.

Buzzwords Blog on Change and Hope

The word change is all around us—on bumper stickers, t-shirts and in stirring speeches. But for Freedom Foundation volunteers, it is more than just something we say—it is something we make. We’ve created change every day for the last two years in Selma, Alabama—the same Selma where Civil Rights workers and foot soldiers created a new future by marching for the right to vote. Though legislative changes are clear and powerful; opportunity, prosperity, and unity still elude this rural city in the Deep South. It is hard to imagine that a town with such a rich history could still have a segregated country club and segregated schools and churches. But in Selma, it is a reality. Neo-confederate hate groups are deeply rooted in the community. Over half of the families in Selma’s Dallas County made less than $30,000 in 2006 and the county has the second highest teenage pregnancy rate in the state. Change is still needed in Selma, Alabama.

Hope drove marchers to face a sea of men in blue uniforms on Bloody Sunday. And they changed the future forever. Change is happening in Selma through hope, one life at a time. Hope isn’t just a word that we use carelessly. It is what drives volunteers to serve the community. Freedom Foundation volunteers have painted local classrooms, playground equipment and churches. They’ve volunteered countless hours to labor in the Tepper’s building, working in hope at a future youth institute and community center. The hours are long and the labor is hard.

But ask the young people who have been changed by their involvement in the youth activities with the Freedom Foundation if the work has been in vain. Ask the local high school senior who recently received his acceptance letter to Samford University, when just over a year ago he said he was “too poor and too black” to go to college.

Hope is that still small voice that rises above cynicism and tells you that change is possible, that we CAN make a difference. Yes, we can. And at the Freedom Foundation, we do. Hope is what inspires our volunteers to give, serve, love and sacrifice. And, as Obama said, “There is nothing false about hope.”

Commonly Confused Words: Clever versus Cleaver

That's one clever meat murder suspect.

"Nuff said.

Freedom Foundation Paints Selma One Wall at a Time

With Christmas tunes on their lips and paintbrushes in their hands, Freedom Foundation volunteers recently took on their sixth painting project for the Selma community.

Painters included amateurs from Keith and Selma High, and Terry Armstrong, a veteran painter who has painted more homes, classrooms, and churches than she can count.

Volunteers of all ages and singing abilities sang Christmas tunes and harmonized on Bob Marley as they stood on desks, chairs and the occasional ladder to reach the tops of the walls. Some cut in around the edges and some refilled paint trays and water bottles to keep the operation running smoothly. “It was good to see all the volunteers working together" Armstrong said.

Armstrong added, "It does my heart good to know that the Freedom Foundation is doing these kinds of projects for the kids. Most of the schools are in dire conditions from a visual standpoint." In a time of cutbacks in education budgets, aesthetic projects like these often go overlooked even though studies show a link between a positive school environment and better test scores.

Whether their scores go up or not, Armstrong is "excited the students will come back from Christmas break to the smell of fresh paint.”

Mark Duke, president of the Foundation, said, “People talk a lot about the condition of the schools. It’s important to get out there and improve them when the opportunity comes up.”

Cool Cause, Bad Grammar

This site seeks to "make the world a better place, one gift at a time." (changingthepresent.org) What a fantastic cause!

I'd feel bad using such a cool site as a bad example if I didn't think its presence here might also gain some positive attention for its cause.

The mistake involves a troublesome apostrophe: "a holistic package addressing all the barriers that girls' face to ensure educational success." The apostrophe after girls is unnecessary because it's simply referring to more than one girl. We all learned our basic plural rules in elementary school, and this one is about as basic as they come. Say it with me now...if there's more than one of something you add an s! And that's it. It's not, "add an s and then throw an apostrophe in there somewhere."

While we're on the subject, let's discuss a common misconception about those Christmas cards you've been folding, sealing and addressing. No apostrophe necessary in the recipient's name. More than one Gibson (for example) at the home? Cool--add an s. Don't add an arbitrary apostrophe and leave the recipients wondering what should follow. The Gibson's what? The Gibson's house? The Gibson's cat??

We've covered a lot of grammar ground here. Now go make the world a better place, one charitable gift and one appropriately-used plural rule at a time.

An Everyday Error

A recent email to Obama-Biden supporters demonstrates an everyday error. We've discussed this before, so refer back to November 11th for another example.

Do you see the problem here? Everyday is an adjective (and therefore modifies a noun). Every day, on the other hand, is a description of frequency.

Therefore, the highlighted word in the email here should be two words.

Need a handy trick? As a former English teacher, it just so happens that I have one.
*If you can substitute each day then it should be two words.
--I find grammatical errors every day.
*If it modifies a noun, it should be one word.
--Finding grammatical errors is an everyday activity.

A Bountiful Thanksgiving

A mountain of mashed potatoes. Carrot casserole in cheese sauce. Authentic Thai noodles (thanks Panida!!). Cranberry sauce. Cookies. Cupcakes. And of course the plate of turkey that still overflows even though our gracious host sent bags full home with every guest.

When I look in the fridge today, the word bounty comes to mind. Though it may seem a strange word to use in 2008--a year in which high gas prices, shrinking retirement accounts and a struggling economy dominate conversation--it helps to have a little perspective.

My host's local newspaper discusses how much we have to be thankful for in the midst of trying times and brings back an article written during WWII. During a time of much more struggle and scarcity than the present, our nation stopped to be thankful for the half loaf of bread the rations allowed. The article discusses how, during times of plenty, we are more prone to take it for granted.

So even though times are tight for many close to me, I'm ever so grateful for a full holiday and a full belly. I'm grateful for the chance to travel and be with family and for a room in a warm home with hospitable hosts who will drive hours to the airport, rearrange plans and provide meal after lovely meal. I'm thankful for authentic Thai food, and even more so, for the authentic chefs. Oh yes, this Thanksgiving was more than just sufficient: it was bountiful.

Article: Plenty to be Thankful for in Worse Times Than These

Grammar Wall of Shame: Trouble With Ants, Anyone?

Finally, a cream that ages ants! I'm tired of seeing all those energetic little guys flaunting their muscles and carrying 50 times their weight all over the place. Apply this cream to clean ants morning and night and put them back in their place!

Note** If the marketers need a new ad writer, I'm for hire. Check out my portfolio.

Grammar Wall of Shame (everyday versus every day)

It's too small to read, but at the very bottom it says, "I wish you the greatest of success, and remember, being healthy is like making your bed. It really is something we have to work at everyday."

Do you see the problem here? Everyday is an adjective (and therefore modifies a noun). Every day, on the other hand, is a description of frequency.

The sentence above should be changed to the following: It really is something we have to work at every day.

Need a handy trick? As a former English teacher, it just so happens that I have one.
*If you can substitute each day then it should be two words.
--I find grammatical errors every day.
*If it modifies a noun, it should be one word.
--Finding grammatical errors is an everyday activity.

Wall of Shame: Grammer versus Grammar

It is one thing for students to write grammer and quite another to find it written as such in a textbook, which is exactly what happened to me last year in one of my literature textbooks. I can still see it on the page: grammer. What an abomination! No wonder so many of my students couldn't spell it!

I started a mini-campaign in my classroom and had students repeat the mantra, "There is no me in grammar!" When I shared this story with a friend who is as geeky as I (yes, that's the correct pronoun), he corrected me with the following explanation of grammer:

I'm afraid your aversion to "grammer" is lost on me. It's a perfectly good word:

gram•mer (noun)

1. One who makes or has made a living delivering singing telegrams, candygrams, etc.

2. One who has a love for the metric system (esp. as it relates to measurements of mass) and who feels a strong compulsion to convert measurements made in any other system to metric.

3. (dialect) A variant form of "grandma." ("...that was after we got back from Grammer's and Papper's house."

Grammar Wall of Shame: Election Humor

Excerpted from a story on usatoday.com:

"On the plane back to Chicago, Obama strolled back to speak with reporters who have been covering his campaign, saying he wanted to shank them for having "shared this process with us."

You'd think Mr. Obama would want better for the media members who have stuck it out with him all these months than to whack them badly with a 3-iron.

**contributed by fellow Grammar Geek, Wally**

Guess My Grammar Gripe

I would like your input on this one, blog followers.


Tell me why you think this upsets me. Then, tell me if you agree with the Wheat Thins folks or me and why.