The day 14 segment is posted at:
http://www.genechambers.com/day-14.htm
. . .
Anu Garg over at A.Word.A.Day has had the temerity to viciously attack my beloved -ly adverbs. Well, not so much viciously as unnecessarily. In today's edition she wrote:
The adverb is a stepchild of the language. Usage pundits, grammar gurus, and language mavens have been denouncing it ad nauseam: Don't pay much attention to the adverb. It makes you (and your writing) look bad. Let it stay in the basement of the language. Why don't you talk with nouns and verbs instead?
Adverbs do have a job. Push them away and you're left wondering how to answer questions such as: How? In what manner? To what degree?
When people advise avoiding the adverb, they're referring to words ending in -ly: extremely, really, endlessly, etc. It may be OK to use such words sparingly, but your writing appears stilted if they are used often.
Many adverbs don't end in -ly. In fact, in the few sentences here, I used such adverbs aplenty (ad nauseam, often, aplenty). This week we have lined up five such adverbs. Try them on for size. And if an adverb fits, why not have a ball with it?
Jeez-oo! I suppose this means that now I am expected to revise all those useful and effective little 'ly' words I struggled so mightily to think up and insert into my sadly and scantly sparse NaNoWriMo novel.
Humph!
. . .
The Official Website of the U.S. Social Security Administration
The Social Security Administration has a brand new website and they have announced that the new site will make it easier for users to navigate around and through its formerly formidable labyrinth of bureaucratic bilge and blather to find some useful information. Having perused this new format, I must admit that it is a great improvement, and I hereby offer my sincere congratulations to the Administration.
. . .
The Arts and Entertainment Channel has a new show coming up:
Psychic Kids: Children of the Paranormal
Appended below is what PZ Myers esteemed professor of biology and noted proponent of atheism has to say about it:
Sounds awful already, doesn't it? But it's worse than you think: they're looking for disturbed kids who think they've got magic powers, and then they're flying in "professional psychics" to coach them in dealing with their awesome powers, i.e., indulge their delusions, get off on feeling superior to unhappy kids, and collect a paycheck for psychic child abuse.
They're putting kids in the hands of a creepy skeevo like Chip Coffey, all for your entertainment.
Call or write to the Arts and Entertainment channel and let them know that their schlock has reached a new and despicable low.
. . .
A while back I posted a photo of JoAnn's little potted plant from which had just spring a pretty pink flower from its single bud. Well... the plant has thrived under her caring and gentle ministrations, and below is the result of that care.
Shows what can be accomplished with work and dedication
__________
"Let me live, love and say it well in good sentences."
--Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
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