Though it might offend our pride to realize, not everything we have to say is as important as we might think. We draw breath to speak a simple sentence because a thought has occurred to us, but that one thought doesn’t live alone; it takes its life along with other thoughts, some only half expressed, …
Author Archives: rultimo
The Innocence of Omission
Let’s jump into the deep end of the pool and see if we can keep our heads above water while we sort out a sentence that illustrates a common grammatical arrangement in English. One confounding characteristic of the language is that it often does not feel the need to say explicitly everything it means. That …
You’re Always In Such a Mood
Strange to say, but verbs, like people, have moods. Let’s look at these three short sentences and see how they differ in form and purpose: You’re always on time, Always be on time, and I wish you’d been on time. Let’s begin by understanding what is meant by the word mood. As a grammatical term, …
Just When Did It Happen?
Here’s a sentence that can teach us a little about the mystery of time: I just talked with tech support, but they didn’t have an answer and they had escalated the ticket to Level II support. Something is not quite right here, and the problem lies in what is called the sequence of tenses, the …
Concise and Precise
Clear and concise. Simple and direct. These are qualities of good writing, certainly, but when we are revising our sentences, where is the line between concision and imprecision? Take, for example, this sentence: By the time they arrived, I had already had breakfast. A quick look might suggest to us that there’s no need to …