[bkcunningham1]

Boomer, I am sorry to hear you are under the weather. I hope you are feeling better soon. Here's something to pass the time until you shine again like the sun. Reading is good medicine for a sore throat, that is, if it is done silently.

http://www.twobells.com/Writing_Onli...on/Welcome.htm

[downeaster]

Originally Posted by Boomer

](And now for a shameless confession. I, Boomer B. Boomer, read the POA newsletter online sometimes. I don't know what happened to their forum, but the newsletter is still there I think. And I will continue to read it. Yes! I will! I know nothing is perfect. I like a little balance in my information. I think balance is a good thing. I am a Libra. Yes. I am. We like balance. I always buy chairs in pairs.) [/SIZE]

Soooo, how's that for boring.....

Boomer -- face down in the stream of consciousness again...and did I tell you that I have a sore throat and a fever? Yes. I do.

I agree in triplicate. The POA point of view is often in conflict with mine but it serves a purpose.

Hope you are on the mend, Boomer.

[Boomer]

After my fevered, boring post earlier today, Mr Boomer and I ventured out to find a Doc-in-a-Box. The Doc-in-a-Box we found looked like the doctor in those Norman Rockwell paintings. And, of course, if a doctor steps right out from a Norman Rockwell painting and tells you that you need to do something, well – you do exactly what he tells you to do. And so I am taking an antibiotic. I really do believe that I feel better already. So if I am going to write any other fevered posts, I guess I had better hurry.

Boomer

[uujudy]

Talk Host, Gerunds? Really? I think you might be a little bit of a troublemaker. . .

BKCunningham, You definitely win the prize!
Thanks for the definition AND the link to Raya's Dungeon. I especially enjoyed the dungeon of Mutilating Modifiers and Damaging Dirty Dangling Participles!

Boomer, I'm sad that you couldn't play the video in your feverish state. Boo Hoo

And now I'm going to sit with Chuck and Gracie.

[zcaveman]

Tony - you know how you have a trash can for deleted posts on the listing view? Maybe you should have an icon for hijacked post.

It is not that I don't mind the banter but it detracts from the subject matter.

And yes - I know I am just as much to blame.

[SALYBOW]

Misinformation...or mind????

[TrudyM]

Originally Posted by uujudy

What an interesting discussion! I don't recall discussing (much less thinking about) misplaced modifiers in the past 40 or 50 years, yet here we are, stretching our little gray cells and learning something new so we can astound everybody at the next block party. Or not.

Boomer, I actually watched the video about the new punctuation mark at your Grammar Girl link.

Lucky you, I am not an english major and I often have my modifiers in the wrong place. Living with a Hawaiian has made it worse. Alot of statments in Asian languages have the qualifiers at the end, as a result people who grew up speaking hawaiian pigin, often put the modifiers and qualifiers at the end of the statement and you have to kind of guess what they mean. My husband has worked hard over 30 plus years and his grammer has really gotten much better, however mine has gotten worse.

I wonder how many mistakes I made in that blurb.

[tony]

What does your husband do, sweep all the adjectives in a paragraph into a pile at the end?

[TrudyM]

Originally Posted by tony

What does your husband do, sweep all the adjectives in a paragraph into a pile at the end?

The bigest mistake Hawaiians use is they use the word "for" when they mean "to". People are always saying " We go for eat." instead of We are going out to eat." Or they double up like. The kind is more better. (means the thing a ma jig is alot better than that one.) Alot of Hawaiians can speak correct english if they want to it is just slang and a habbit, but others who grew up only hearing pigin have to work hard to speak correctly. Sort of like Ebonics.

But an example would be the call I got this week from my brother inlaw.
Larry there? I need for talk later. What time is 4 or three , before or after?

He means, Is Larry home. I will call back later. Is the time differnce 3 or 4 hours and is it earlier or later there?

[Pturner]

Gerundit! When I'm not misplacing my modifiers, I'm loosing my marbles.

[Annabelle]

What is POA?

[chuckinca]

Property Owners Association.

.

[chuckinca]

Originally Posted by graciegirl

Sit right here with me.

So after Mrs Traphagen made me do 10th grade English again and I got sent into 3rd track (from 1st track) I got to spend the next two years in English checking out Joanne Feldhouse's mini skirt. Joanne did well after HS and was a Northwest Airlines Stew back in the days when Stews were hot.

GG being a former hollaback girl probably was not a bad person to sit next to either.




PS: Boomer, you need to sit with us two/too

.

[Boomer]

Originally Posted by chuckinca

So after Mrs Traphagen made me do 10th grade English again and I got sent into 3rd track (from 1st track) I got to spend the next two years in English checking out Joanne Feldhouse's mini skirt. Joanne did well after HS and was a Northwest Airlines Stew back in the days when Stews were hot.

GG being a former hollaback girl probably was not a bad person to sit next to either.

PS: Boomer, you need to sit with us two/too

.

Hey chuck,

I had to look twice when you said Gracie was a "hollaback girl." And then it dawned on me what it meant. I did what Mrs. Traphagen probably taught you to do when you did not know what a word meant. -- Use the context clues. And I knew that Gracie was a cheerleader (and I bet she was fun to sit next to in class) and then I realized what “hollaback girl” means.…..

"Gimme a T!"

"T" (the holler back)

"Gimme a V !" (the next holler back)

A hollaback girl is a cheerleader!

Thanks for teaching me a new word. Mrs. Traphagen would be proud of you.

Now, about you and Mrs. Traphagen……..……

First of all, please take a look at that sentence, “Mrs. Traphagen made me do 10th grade English again.” -- Sooooo, that’s how you still see it….allllll these years later. Mrs. Traphagen made you. Oh my goodness. You had nothing to do with it huh. Are you sure you do not still owe the unforgettable Mrs. Traphagen a two-page essay on Silas Marner?

Please understand that I am not trying to give you a hard time. And I am glad things worked out so well for you. But for some reason, I feel compelled to speak up for the Mrs. Traphagens everywhere.

Nobody ever has flashbacks about their math teachers or their history teachers. Nooooooo, it’s always the English teacher -- well, sometimes it’s the phys ed teacher -- but mostly, it’s all those poor, misunderstood Mrs. Traphagens out there. Did you know that sometimes things can get so difficult and complicated that English teachers have to pretend that they are not English teachers?

I have been around here for a long time and I have already told the story about my friend the English teacher who sometimes lied when asked what kind of work she did. In fact I think I have told the story twice since 2007. But at risk of being criticized for being redundant, I think I need to tell it again, in case you have not seen it. This might give you a glimpse into what it could be like to be an English teacher. English teachers know how they are perceived. And sometimes they just gotta do what they gotta do……

If you have read this little story before, forgive me, but I think it is appropriate here in the defense of all those English teachers out there. Sometimes people just need to walk a mile in their sensible shoes. Here's the summer rerun........

A friend of mine is an English teacher. (The most besmirched of all the English majors.) Anyway, in our younger days, when she was still single, she would sometimes go with her friends to a bar, also known as a meet market, to see if there were any possibilities there.

She was a clever English major because she knew exactly what to do when some guy started hitting on her by asking, "Hey, baby, what's your sign?"

She would tell him her sign. (A lot of English majors are Libras I bet.) And she would wait for the next question which was usually, "Where do you work?"

If she thought he was cute and had possibilities, she would say, "I work for the phone company." (I don't know why she picked the phone company, but she always said that.)

Of course, if she thought he was a jerk or a loser, she would just say, "I am an English teacher." She knew that would guarantee that he would flee or at least move down a couple of barstools.

With the ones she liked, she used her way with words to lure them in. Later, when she got around to telling them that she did not really work for the phone company and that she was, in fact, an English teacher, by that time, those guys were so completely smitten that they always said they understood and forgave her immediately.

She eventually married a guy who came to fix her furnace. And fix it he did. And they lived happily ever after.

- - - - - - -

So anyway, the point of all this is that English teachers might need to be cut a little slack. It’s not easy to grade all those papers and to try to teach teenagers to appreciate literature and to hang around in bars all night telling lies and to have a furnace that needs fixing.

Boomer

[bkcunningham1]

Boomer, just imagine if fate had twisted differently for you English teacher friend. What if the man who fixed her furnace had left after stoking her coals and said, "I'll holla back at ya"? I'm sure your English teacher friend would have screamed at him and his departing toolbox, "I aint no holla back girl."

(Gwen Stefani, songwriter of I Ain't No Hollaback Girl, contributed to this response.)