grammar

When is Fussy Too Fussy?

/ Beth Younker / Leave a comment

I started a new job a few months ago and was put on a project to update all of the documents on our SharePoint site as they needed rebranding. Sounds pretty easy, doesn’t it? Replace a few different old company words/acronyms with the new ones, replace the logo, update colors and voila, update done. Unfortunately for me, I’m also REALLY persnickety about formatting, spelling, and punctuation, so as I find documents that need fixing, I have to fix them.  It’s just not in my nature to ignore them. I’ve tried, and I absolutely, positively can’t do it.

Why is it that so many professionals in business don’t know how to create a clean, professional business document? I can’t even begin to tell you how many times I’ve seen sentences without periods at the end, confusion around common and proper nouns, commas where they don’t belong, and other assorted issues. I know, I know, you’re all rolling your eyes at me, it’s ok! I know I’m strange about stuff like this, and I can live with it.

Years ago, I had a manager who was picker than me about making documents look good, and at the time she really got on me about mistakes. I remember being upset with her at the time, but honestly, she taught me so much. (I saw her several years ago and told her how grateful I was for what she taught me, and that turned out to be one of the most gratifying conversations I have ever had!) She made me a really good proofreader…for other people’s documents, that is. For my own, not so much. I don’t know why I can’t see my own mistakes, but it’s probably because I’m too close to them. The good news is that at least I know it and ask other people to proofread for me when it’s important or run everything through spell and grammar check. I don’t know why everyone doesn’t do that. I just think it looks awful to have those kinds of mistakes in a document that is being shared outside of your team, and worse, with clients because you know that the client has someone just as odd as me, who will see those careless mistakes. (If you read a prior post from me about job hunting, you’ll remember I commented on my discovery that my spell and grammar check wasn’t working and how horrified I was about the cover letters I’d sent out.)

Another annoyance for me is not aligning numbers and bullets in a list. Use the functions built into the application to align things correctly for heaven’s sake! That’s what the indent is for, or the little tab markers in the ruler at the top of the page. I’ve seen indent used on one line, spaces on the next and nothing on a line following that, so nothing lined up correctly at all! All of this fussiness meant that my fairly simple little project grew exponentially because of my own pickiness. Yep, it’s my own fault, I know that. At least when I was done with them, they looked fantastic. Unfortunately, no one appointed me proofreading czar, so that means I’ll have to learn to bite my tongue going forward as those same people will continue to churn out documents with the same reckless abandon they always have. 

Maybe someday I’ll be in charge and can have that expectation on my team but in the meantime, I’ll have to learn to roll my eyes in silence, which is probably a good skill to have anyhow. To amuse myself in the interim I’ve been reading “Eats Shoots and Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation” by Lynne Truss. It’s a humorous look at what a difference correct punctuation makes in writing. Just the title ought to be enough to demonstrate. If one were to add a comma, it becomes “Eats, Shoots and Leaves” meaning sometime came along, ate something then took a photograph (or perhaps shot a bow and arrow or fired a gun) then left. Without the comma it is “Eats Shoots and Leaves” meaning the diet of an herbivore. Punctuation matters!

So after all my ranting above, did you find any errors I missed? Let me know, please! Also, what pet peeves in your professional life you do you have?  Feel free to share. I know I’ll feel better not being the only fussy one out there. 

Like, Um…

/ Beth Younker / 1 Comment


Four times a year, the wise editors at the Oxford English Dictionary do their revisions, adding  words to remain current with today’s lingo. Among the new entries this year were:

‘Clicktivism’, a word to describe a person who, ‘signals support for a political or social cause by means of the Internet, through social media, online petitions, etc., rather than by more substantive involvement’; a shout-out to Star Wars lovers, with ‘Yoda‘ added as a noun, meaning: ‘a person who embodies the characteristics of Yoda, esp. in being wise; an elder, sage or guru.’; ‘Non-apology’, a statement that takes the form of an apology but does not acknowledge responsibility or express regret for what has caused offence or upset; an insincere or unconvincing apology; and ‘Squee’, representing a high-pitched squealing or squeaking sound produced by an animal, musical instrument, etc.

I have noticed, however, the overuse of a certain word (and I’m guilty of it myself, although I’m trying very hard to be cognizant of it and avoid it well, similar to the proverbial plague), that seems to be pervasive in our society, and perhaps in our younger adults more than the older ones, although it’s not limited to them. That word is “like“.  Now I have to admit with some shame (but only for research purposes for this blog article, mind you!), I watched a clip of “Rob and Chyna” online. images
The whole Kardashian thing is a train wreck in slow motion, and I feel like it just sucks my brain cells out of my head, and this short clip reinforced that for me, ugh. But what was notable for me about it was in 52 seconds, “like” was used 8 times. Rob only did it twice, but Chyna said “like” 6 times in 16 seconds!

Are a few of you squirming in your seats right now, feeling a bit uncomfortable? Thinking “I wonder, do I do that?” If so, and the answer is maybe, then start listening to yourself when you talk, or ask your friends to do it. Or, consider falling back to an old trick I picked up in a class on how to teach adult learners. Videotape yourself and then watch it so you can see what needs to change. So if you think you might be using the word “like” too often when speaking, set up your smartphone to record yourself during conversations. Just make sure to get permission from the other people participating in the conversation to record them too, otherwise you get to stand in front of some nice judge having this conversation instead:

“Will the defendant please rise and explain herself?”

“Um yes, Your Honor. I was like trying to  like record myself to see if like I say like too much when I like talk to my friends and like explain things. I just don’t understand like why I don’t do like well in interviews. I mean, like I’m a nice person, people like me, and like……”

By now the judge has driven bamboo under her fingernails and ground her molars into nubs, and is hissing between her clenched teeth at the bailiff “DO NOT MOVE ” as he waits to launch over the tables to clamp his hand over your mouth, just to make you stop using the word “like”!

Maybe those nice folks at the Oxford English Dictionary can announce days during the year where we just don’t use those overused words. Would’t it’s be interesting to find some other way to talk? When I started writing this today, I had to stop and think about it myself, as I didn’t want to use the word and say “like the proverbial plague”. Sometimes being aware and calling attention to things is enough, and we stop doing the behavior. Unfortunately, however, it seems it worked in reverse with those dratted Kardashians. Calling attention to them has just made them worse and the general public salivate like a pack of wild dogs.

Well, when the Kardashians go away, you’ll hear a loud squee from me, that’s for sure!