Day 59

Check your work

By any and all means possible, because if you are using the English language then you’re going to be tripped up.

For instance, just the use of simple words like then, and than, there, and their, and many others. Just the very simplest of words have many meanings some of them obscure, some of them, well, you get my drift.

ESL students often tear what little hair they have left out over the words. We English users, we are different again, being American English, English English, and a dozen other variations.

There’s center and centre, just to name one when it comes to American and English.

It depends on what spell checker you use to check the spelling, and what grammar checker you use, and generally not 100 per cent effective.

I let Microsoft Editor have fun with my writing, and then tend to ignore a lot of the suggestions. They just sound weird.

I have a basic Grammarly, but it doesn’t do a whole lot and it costs a lot of money to get the so-called good one.

You have to decide the way you want to go, but you will have to have your work checked for grammar and spelling and facts.

And probably read a dozen grammar texts to get the best way to write your sentences. Mine often start out somewhat strange, but we get there in the end.

…

As a case in point: the word Line

The English language has some marvellous words that can be used so as to have any number of meanings

For instance,

Draw a line in the sand

We would all like to do this with our children, job, and relationships, but for some reason, the idea sounds really good in our heads, but it never quite works out. What does it mean, whatever it is, this I’d where it ends or changes because it can’t keep going the way it is.

Inevitably it leads to,

You’ve crossed the line

Which at some point in our lives, and particularly when children, we all do a few times until, if we’re lucky we learn where that line is. It’s usually considered 8n tandem with pushing boundaries.

Of course, there is

A line you should never cross

And I like to think we all know where that is. Unfortunately, some do not and often find their seemingly idyllic life totally shattered beyond repair. An affair from either side of a marriage or relationship can do that.

You couldn’t walk a straight line if you tried

While we might debate what straight might mean in this context, for this adaptation it means staying on the right side of legality. Some people find a life of crime more appealing than doing honest days work.

This goes hand in hand with,

You’re spinning me a line

This means you are being somewhat loose with the truth, perhaps in explaining where you’ve been and what you’ve been doing. I think sometimes liars forget they need to have good memories.

Then there are the more practical uses of the word, such as

I have a new line of products

Is that a new fishing line?

Those I think most of us get, but it’s the more ambiguous that we have trouble with. Still, ambiguity is a writer’s best friend and we can make up a lot of stuff from just using one word.