 Red Room Writer Profile
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June Casagrande's Blog
October 26, 2009
- I've never found word origins very interesting. Every once in a while, I'll wonder how we ended up with a word like "shampoo," so I'll look it up to see that it comes from a Hindi word meaning "to massage."But for the most part, in those moments when I'm feeling both intellectually curious and energetic enough to do something about it, I'd much rather learn about chemistry ...
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October 19, 2009
October 8, 2009
- "Americans concerned about heart health, but not proactive enough to prevent it."http://www.physorg.com/news173942032.html(Thanks to reader 8'FED for that.)
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September 17, 2009
- Longtime New York TV newsman Ernie Anastos recently told a colleague, on air, something that sounds a whole lot like "keep fucking that chicken." The context makes it more baffling. It seems he may have been trying to express something akin to "Keep up the good work."I've never understood the mindless banter of local broadcast news nougatnoggins. But this is a step ...
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September 8, 2009
- I try not to get irked by words like "incentivize." I understand why other people do, but I figure there's no use in letting acceptable usages get under my skin. Best to save my energy for stuff like "enthused" in quotation attributions. ("'It's a great deal,' Thompson enthused.")But over the weekend, I heard an "incentivized" I just cannot let stand. I was ...
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August 31, 2009
- Alice Munro has withdrawn her story collection "Too Much Happiness" from consideration from the Giller Prize because, according to her publisher, "She has won twice and would like to leave the field to younger writers." I thought the folks at Red Room would appreciate that. Here's the full story.
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August 28, 2009
- Copy editing somewhat-green writers is starting to affect me. On several occasions lately I have found myself mentally editing the sentences of someone talking on TV or radio. Not a good sign.That may be why I found this sentence in today's New York Times so striking. Then again, maybe the sentence is striking. It's from a review of Big Fan starring Patton Oswalt (whose standup comedy I love, ...
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August 25, 2009
- It's as enticing as the caramel topping on a candied apple. (changed to)It's as enticing as a caramel apple.* * * *Autumn is a great time to enjoy the region's ambient weather.(changed to)Autumn is a great time to enjoy the region's weather.
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August 24, 2009
- short and shriftOn some level, I like the expression short shrift. But I just can't condone such unhealthy codependency. Like trove and amok, shrift is devoted to a partner that doesn't return the loyalty. On any given day, short can be seen running around all over town with everything from sell to order cook to man's disease.This case of codependency is so bad that shrift has pretty much lost ...
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August 11, 2009
- Here are a few grammar questions from a sample ACT college admissions test I found online.2. As a result of his method for early music education, Shinichi Suzuki (has been known as one) of the world's great violin teachers.A. has been known as oneB. had been known as oneC. is seen as oneD. is being seen as oneE. has been one16. Each night when night came (and the temperature fell,) my parents lit ...
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August 4, 2009
- I changed: "As of now, the program is slated to continue till Dec. 1" to: "The program is slated to continue till Dec. 1.""As of now" crops up in my own speech and writing. But I never realized today how detestable it is, at least in journalistic writing. (It's like I'm having some kind of hate epiphany.) In journalism, where economy of words is a virtue, "as of ...
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August 3, 2009
- Before I started blogging, I read a message board on which a blogger asked users: What do you like/dislike in a blog?The first response, and the one that stuck with me, was: "I hate it when every blog post starts out with, 'Sorry I haven't blogged in so long' and/or 'I've been busy.' Great advice. Who wants to read a blog about the blogger not blogging (or about the blogger blogging, for ...
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July 16, 2009
- According to a 2002 New Republic article, senator Jeff Sessions failed to get appointed to a federal bench after hearings in the 1980s revealed he had made a pro-Ku Klux Klan comment. Sessions' defense was that it was a joke. And there's more -- such as reports of using the word "boy." I don't have time to give this a thorough treatment right now. But I thought that those unaware of ...
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July 7, 2009
- run-on sentence = 373,000 hits misplaced modifier = 40,100 hits I don't believe in run-on sentences. My working theory is that they're bogeymen invented by professional writers in order to scare the crap out of aspiring writers, divert newbies' attention from more important issues like misplaced modifiers, and thereby thin out the competition.In all my years of copy editing and reading friends' ...
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July 6, 2009
- The Washington Post had a good piece a few days ago about an increasing number of typos in their paper -- a trend that corresponds with a decrease in the number of copy editors there.The article cites a decade-old study that emphasizes how messy copy can hurt a newspaper's bottom line (that means money, to all you publisher types). The idea is that "each misspelled word, bad apostrophe, ...
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