If you've mowed the lawn this summer, you've cut swaths of grass. If you injured yourself while doing it (and we hope you didn't!), you might use a swathe in your recovery. So, apply this logic to last week's quiz, and the answer becomes clear: The storm pummeled large swaths of the state. But it looks like most of you didn't need that help: In American English, "swath" describes a broad strip (usually of land), while "swathe" is a strip of cloth. And that brings us to the little hint in the...
20 days ago • 1 min read
If you really, really wanted to look for it, there was a clue in last week's subject line that might have helped you on the quiz. The subject line was, "Like the ones that came before." Not "befor," which we realize isn't a word. But the second "e" in "before" might help you remember the difference between forego and forgo. "Forego" means to go before, while "forgo" means to abstain from. And we use foregone in the phrase "foregone conclusion." So the correct sentence from last week's quiz...
27 days ago • 1 min read
Happy Friday! We hope you had a good Fourth of July weekend. We're back in your inbox this week with another writing quiz, and for this one we're taking it back to our quiz roots with a set of commonly confused words...with a slight twist 🔀 The committee agreed to ______ further discussion since approval was a _______ conclusion. forgo, forgone forego, foregone forgo, foregone forego, forgone If this one's too easy for you, tell us: What's an editing challenge we can help you with? We might...
about 1 month ago • 1 min read
One fun thing about writing is that it's both rule-based and flexible. So sometimes, there are no wrong answers. Such is the case with last week's quiz, when we asked you about the plural of octopus. Your choices were octopi (the plural that assumes a Latin origin of the word), octopodes (the proper plural for a word of Greek origin) and octopuses (the English way to pluralize it). Most of you picked "octopi," and exactly zero people chose "octopodes": No one got it wrong, and even if someone...
about 2 months ago • 1 min read
Today is the longest day of the year, and we can't write much more about it without revealing the answer to last week's quiz, so let's get right to it. The quiz was part vocabulary, part capitalization. We asked you to fill in the blank in this sentence: "They’re planning a party on the _______ to mark the longest day of the year." First, you had to recognize that the event marking the start of both summer and winter is a solstice, not an equinox, which marks the start of spring and fall....
about 2 months ago • 1 min read
Happy Friday...the 13th. Most of you got the right answer on last week's quiz. Just as you spell out one through nine and use numerals for 10 and higher, you do the same for ordinals. So this month we have Friday the 13th, and next month we'll have July Fourth. You got a peek at our Google Docs extension last week, and this week we're excited to share another great review: "Style Guide Checker is a great product that provides a second set of eyes to catch things that often go overlooked. Not...
2 months ago • 2 min read
Whether you use "kitty" or "catty" before "corner" to describe something that is diagonally opposite, you're not talking about cats. In fact, the origin of "kitty-corner" is more closely related to dice 🎲 🎲 That wasn't an option on last week's quiz, and we didn't trick you by giving you the option to pick "cats." Most of you guessed "diagonal," and while that is part of the word's meaning now, the origin of "kitty-corner" goes back to the French word meaning "four." English speakers adapted...
2 months ago • 1 min read
Did you see any flags flying at half-staff on Memorial Day? What about at half-mast? These terms are often used interchangeably to describe flags that are flown only halfway up the flagpole, and the answers to last week's quiz on the terms were pretty evenly split. We probably should have added an "it depends" answer choice, though. Everyone technically got it right, but we recommend using "half-staff" as the default term, as it's what's used for flags on land. Reserve "half-mast" for flags...
3 months ago • 1 min read
Dangling modifiers creep into our speaking and writing all the time, but you all are pretty good at spotting one 🧐 If you didn't take last week's quiz, you might be thinking, "What are dangling modifiers and how can I avoid them?" Dangling modifiers occur when a sentence begins with an adjectival modifier but the subject of that modifier is misplaced in the sentence or simply isn't there at all. Longtime newsletter readers will be familiar with our favorite high-profile example that's easily...
3 months ago • 2 min read