In the past, I’ve talked about my preference for Ms over Mrs and Miss. There’s another honorific I wanted to discuss today: Mx.
Category: Writing
Difference between whole and entire
This is part of the difference between series. If you use the word whole in a sentence (such as, “I counted the whole crowd.”), chances are Microsoft Word will suggest that you change it for entire. There isn’t much difference between whole and entire. In fact, several dictionaries have whole and entire as synonyms of each other—that’s how close they are… Continue reading Difference between whole and entire
5 tricks to reduce word count in your ridiculously long essay
I remember my communications teacher in college once had us write a 500-word assignment. I don’t remember the topic, but I remember how difficult it was to limit it to just 500 words. After my classmates and I had each finished the assignment, she gave us our next one: cut the writing in half. That’s right,… Continue reading 5 tricks to reduce word count in your ridiculously long essay
How to enter the degree symbol on an iPhone
[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ admin_label=”section”][et_pb_row admin_label=”row”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ parallax=”off” parallax_method=”on”][et_pb_text admin_label=”Text”] The weather is heating up, and it won’t be long before everyone is talking about how hot it is where they live. As they do, many social media posts are going to be missing something. The degree symbol. People are going to write things like, “It’s 26 out”… Continue reading How to enter the degree symbol on an iPhone
How to use bold and italics on social media
One of the problems with online communication is the inability to create emphasis in the text we type. This problem is particularly present in blog comments and social media. In the past, I’ve discussed how we should use bold and italics to create emphasis in the words we write. That’s easy enough to do in… Continue reading How to use bold and italics on social media
Stop using capital letters for emphasis
From time to time, I come across people using capitalization to emphasize words. This is wrong. Let me show you why. Consider this sentence:
Do you capitalize “husband”?
Earlier this week, someone ended up on my website searching for the phrase “Do you capitalize husband”. Although that’s not a frequent search phrase used by my website visitors, I thought it would make a good topic for this week’s blog post.
We need to proofread before we post
A few months ago, I wrote an article about how correcting others’ grammar online is classist. On the opposite end of the argument is the idea that we shouldn’t worry about how we write at all. I engage with a lot of people online: Facebook, Twitter, comment sections, and more. Seriously. A lot. Something I… Continue reading We need to proofread before we post
2 reasons why I avoid keyword stuffing when writing for the web
Last week, a potential client phoned me about writing some content for the website. They had been concerned that they hadn’t been receiving the traffic they wanted, so their website person told them that they probably needed new content optimized for keywords. I told them to email me the details, and that I’d take a… Continue reading 2 reasons why I avoid keyword stuffing when writing for the web
10 examples of words to use instead of very
I’ve talked before about trying to avoid using very and really in your writing. There is no good reason to use them as modifiers when you can just use a more descriptive word. Here are 10 examples of common very phrases and some alternatives you can use in their place: