Oh utter horror. I made a grammatical error. Multiple errors, more specifically. Constant errors, every time I type. Andy informed me recently that one of the grammar rules I lived by through all my years of writing changed after I graduated, while he was in grad school.
You may not understand how devastating this was for me. Yes, I am a grammar geek. I will edit the best-written pieces, and find errors in books, magazines, and newspapers.
Andy just informed me that when using a computer, after every period, it is ONE space- not two. After all these years, he just informed me of this! My friend and I verified that this indeed has changed (http://www.grammarbook.com/punctuation/spacing.asp). It's a hard habit to break too. So my apologies for all of my e-mails and posts with this error!
Here's my question: how am I, a college graduate who no longer has teachers to update me, supposed to keep apprised of official grammatical (and/or spelling) changes? So I was wondering if any of you use any online reference tools for this sort of thing (and no, spellcheck does NOT count).
9 comments:
I feel your pain. Grammar geeks unite!
Let's keep our fingers crossed that Annika is not crazy, like her mother.
lol...Brock, you are too funny!
I learned this just this year in my typography class. I'm still struggling with putting two spaces after my sentences. Continuing education is very important!
I just found out about this too and it is a hard habit to break.
Hey, I think it's just that so many more men are typing now and they are just too lazy to put in two spaces. I, on the other hand, will continue to put in two 'cause I'm just an old dog and you know the old saying, "you can't teach an old dog new tricks."
A. Elaine
I had NO idea, and I am also a grammar geek. This is going to seriously hinder my ability to finish anything because I'll be counting spaces! Yikes - I just did it twice in this post! There, that's better.
Ben
Oh Brooke! I wish I had known that you were suffering from this problem or else I would have informed you...me, always trying to be the ultimate perfectionist with my writing and editing as well. The two spaces rule between sentences was eradicated years ago, but I find it so funny that you are completely devistated about this! To answer your question, if you don't want to buy the updated MLA, CMS, or APA handbooks that publishers come out with every other year, you can check online--sometimes universities will post updated grammar rules on their websites, especially the English professors. To make you feel better, it is almost impossible to keep up with all of the changes. :o)
Joanna, you never knew I was a grammar geek because I never made you rewrite thank you notes because yours were already perfect! :)
I should have thought of you as the perfect go-to person for this problem; feel free to update me when there's a change!
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