A lexical treasure box full of forgotten...

I have a gorgeous antique copy of Webster’s New Twentieth Century Dictionary of the English Language—Unabridged sitting in my office. It lives right next to the antique typewriter and the antique telephone (the kind where the ear piece and mouth piece are separate and there’s a turn crank for dialing the operator). One could say I have a “thing” for old ways of communicating; I’d say I have an appreciation for the sweet nostalgia surrounding how we used to connect with one another—though inconvenient and awkward (and incredibly heavy) now, these things were...

There IS a Word for That

I am a big word lover (notice I did not say big-word lover: there is a difference. More on hyphens and dashes another time). The English language has a wonderful collection of words we either rarely use and/or don’t realize even exist. Below is a small sampling of words I have come across that I find to be quite interesting; I like them for the linguistics in how they sound when pronounced and also in meaning. For many of these terms, I didn’t even know there was word for “that”!  Ready?   If you have ever had the compulsion to write...

Who or Whom? That is the Question

  In my opinion, of all the grammar decisions in all the land, deciding whether to use who or whom is one of the most difficult. In technical terms, the difference between the two is:   Who can be used in place of the subject of a clause or question: Example: Who told you that was okay? Brian is the one who told me it was okay.   Whom can be used in the place of the object a clause or question: Example: With whom are you going to the movies? Andrew is the guy whom you went with last week.   If you ask me, this is still confusing because the second...

“Snooze-proof” your prose: Passive Voice...

I squawk a lot about using better words in your writing. Better word choice equals less boring prose. Only less boring, though. To make your prose snooze-proof, you need to avoid using passive voice.  In simplest terms, passive voice is when the subject of a sentence is receiving the action of the verb indicated… as opposed to active voice where the subject is the doer of verb indicated. For example: Passive: Mary’s dinner was cooked by Mike. Active: Mike cooked dinner for Mary. The passive voice is not grammatically wrong, but it is boring—and wordy.  Many...

I’m doing “Well” versus “Good”

“How are you?” Oh no. Sweaty palms. Pounding heart. The anxiety induced from this question is agonizing. Are you doing well? Are you doing good? Dun-dun-dun… you look up to the heavens and think, Please don’t strike me down oh gods of grammar goodness… or is it wellness? Oh no oh no oh no!  Take a deep breath. I know it’s confusing. Good, fine, great, well, fantastic, excellent, fantabulous, etc. It seems all the words mean the same thing. So why does it matter if you say “I am doing good” versus “I am doing well”? What is the difference? Good is an...

“Farther” versus “Furt...

Simply put:  Farther refers to literal physical distance:  Samuel lives farther north than Henry.  How much farther do we have to drive before we arrive at Grandma’s condo?  Sally sat farther away from Harold so as to not hear his rant about tiny dogs.  The hair salon was farther from my house than I anticipated.    Further is abstract for “more” of something, like time, depth, or quantity (you could also think of it as “metaphorical” or “figurative” distance):  As we got further into the day, we could tell Harold was uncomfortable with our tiny...