By invitation, I offered Blogs.com a list of my top ten blogs on language and editing — a selection that should not astonish anyone who has been grazing in this pasture.
But I am just one of a number of people who have been invited to submit such lists on various topics. The Internet is such a wilderness — some tall trees but a great deal of scrub intermixed with patches of poison ivy — that a guide is always welcome. Rummage around over there to see what sites you may find useful. There’s a link to the Top 10 Lists in the menu bar at the top of the page.
Make sure you come back here.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Puzzling possessives
A few days ago a reader wondered about the construction pork producers’ and Israelis’ objecting to. Why apostrophes?
The use of a possessive with a gerund (the present participle of a verb functioning as a noun) is common in English. So is the use of a non-possessive noun. Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage finds that both forms have been examined and faulted or endorsed over a long span — and that it is quite common for an author to switch from one to the other. So of these two possibilities —
I can’t stand his creeping up behind me while I’m working
I can’t stand him creeping up behind me while I’m working —
you get to use whichever you like. Another step to reduce usage anxiety!
If the possessive with a gerund makes you step back, you may also be put off momentarily by the double possessive, or double genitive. That is a construction in which possession is indicated twice, by a possessive form and the word of. One refers to a friend of mine rather than a friend of me. (You can also say a friend to me, though it will probably sound stilted to many listeners or readers.)
The construction has an ancient pedigree in English, and Merriam-Webster’s explains its function in reducing ambiguity by distinguishing between an objective genitive and a possessive genitive. Here’s how: Jane’s picture can mean a picture belonging to Jane or a picture of Jane. Saying a picture of Jane’s — the double genitive — distinguishes the former sense from the latter.
The use of a possessive with a gerund (the present participle of a verb functioning as a noun) is common in English. So is the use of a non-possessive noun. Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage finds that both forms have been examined and faulted or endorsed over a long span — and that it is quite common for an author to switch from one to the other. So of these two possibilities —
I can’t stand his creeping up behind me while I’m working
I can’t stand him creeping up behind me while I’m working —
you get to use whichever you like. Another step to reduce usage anxiety!
If the possessive with a gerund makes you step back, you may also be put off momentarily by the double possessive, or double genitive. That is a construction in which possession is indicated twice, by a possessive form and the word of. One refers to a friend of mine rather than a friend of me. (You can also say a friend to me, though it will probably sound stilted to many listeners or readers.)
The construction has an ancient pedigree in English, and Merriam-Webster’s explains its function in reducing ambiguity by distinguishing between an objective genitive and a possessive genitive. Here’s how: Jane’s picture can mean a picture belonging to Jane or a picture of Jane. Saying a picture of Jane’s — the double genitive — distinguishes the former sense from the latter.
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Presented without comment
An Irish student inserts a bogus quotation in the Wikipedia entry for a recently deceased French composer —“to show how journalists use the internet as a primary source” — and discovers that newspaper and blogs around the world pick it up and use it without making any effort to verify its authenticity.
Wikipedia’s editing does not effectively remove the bogus item, and the fraud is disclosed when the student himself writes to newspapers after a lapse of weeks to inform them.
Wikipedia’s editing does not effectively remove the bogus item, and the fraud is disclosed when the student himself writes to newspapers after a lapse of weeks to inform them.
15 books
Bill Walsh has challenged me on Facebook to do the 15 books thing — but why shold I drive traffic to Facebook, which doesn’t need it, instead of this blog, which does?
The 15 books thing, if you are not familiar with facebook, invites you to list in 15 minutes 15 books important to you. In my case, I’ve construed it to be books that I’ve looked into repeateduly, or the 15 books I would want to pack up when the severance runs out and the sheriff shows up to turn me out of the house. Listed alphabetically by author, so that I don’t have to make further rankings.
Austen, Jane. Emma. Everyone loves Pride and Prejudice, as do I, but I think that this one is more penetrating about personality as well as witty.
Boswell, James, Life of Samuel Johnson. Boswell, though drunken and sometimes loutish, was not some stenographic booby. The Life is a careful assemblage of details and scenes. And I accept Boswell’s governing image of Johnson as a kind of gladiator, battling poverty, ill health, and obscurity to achieve by force of will and intellect the first great English dictionary, a milestone in literary criticism with his commentary on Shakespeare, and the foundation of modern English biography: heroism in the literary life. Great quotes, too.
Cheever, John, Collected Stories. God, I hate to leave out the Wapshot novels, but these stories are extraordinary.
Didion, Joan, We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live. I encountered Didion’s work when she and John Gregory Dunne were writing for the doomed Saturday Evening Post. Nearly all of her nonfiction is collected here, and Slouching Toward Bethlehem still resonates.
Faulkner, William. The Snopes trilogy. OK, this is cheating. But The Hamlet, The Town, and The Mansion have to be read together.
Garner, Bryan. Garner’s Modern American Usage. So I’m a nerd.
Harris, Marvin. Our Kind. The late anthropologist summed up a career’s worth of insight into human societies in this compilation of concise essays on varied topics. But maybe I should have included Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches instead.
Johnson, Samuel. Lives of the English Poets. I said he was a foundation of modern English biography. Read the essays on Milton (of Paradise Lost, Johnson observed that “no man ever wished it longer”), Dryden, and Pope.
Larkin, Philip, Collected Poems. Even since I bought a copy of High Windows while interviewing for The Sun in 1985, I have been an admirer of Larkin’s quiet, precise, wry poetry.
Nabokox, Vladimir, Pnin. A perfect comic novel, both hilarious and humane.
Trillin, Calvin. The Tummy Trilogy. Another cheat. Alice, Let’s Eat and Tillin’s other books as a happy eater are included in one volume. Enjoy.
Trollope, Anthony. Barchester Towers. I can’t recall how many times I’ve read this novel of life among Anglican clergy in a 19th-century British cathedral town, but it has never failed to give pleasure.
Vidal, Gore. Lincoln. Yes, a novel, but one well informed by current historical scholarship. An absorbing study of the main character, with deliciously malicious takes on the secondary ones.
Waugh, Evelyn. Scoop. Funniest. Novel. About. Newspapering. Ever.
Wilbur, Richard. New and Collected Poems. One of our most literate, polished, and hunorous poets. Oh, the patter song for the syphilitic Dr. Pangloss he wrote for the original Broadway production of Candide: “Columbus and his men, they say, / Conveyed the virus hither, / By which my features rot away / And vital powers wither. / But had they not traversed the seas / And come infected back, / Just think of all the luxuries / That modern life would lack. / All bitter things conduce to sweet, / As this example shows: / Without the little spirochete / We’d have no chocolate to eat, / Nor would tobacco’s frgance greet / The European nose.”*
Fifteen — that’s not nearly enough. I’ve left out Theodore Roethke and Robert Lowell. And Lucky Jim. All of Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe mysteries. Conan Doyle! The Prophet Isaiah. H.L. Mencken’s Days memoirs. Mark Twain. Gatsby! Stupid Facebook meme.
* Forgive me any slips; I’m working from memory.
The 15 books thing, if you are not familiar with facebook, invites you to list in 15 minutes 15 books important to you. In my case, I’ve construed it to be books that I’ve looked into repeateduly, or the 15 books I would want to pack up when the severance runs out and the sheriff shows up to turn me out of the house. Listed alphabetically by author, so that I don’t have to make further rankings.
Austen, Jane. Emma. Everyone loves Pride and Prejudice, as do I, but I think that this one is more penetrating about personality as well as witty.
Boswell, James, Life of Samuel Johnson. Boswell, though drunken and sometimes loutish, was not some stenographic booby. The Life is a careful assemblage of details and scenes. And I accept Boswell’s governing image of Johnson as a kind of gladiator, battling poverty, ill health, and obscurity to achieve by force of will and intellect the first great English dictionary, a milestone in literary criticism with his commentary on Shakespeare, and the foundation of modern English biography: heroism in the literary life. Great quotes, too.
Cheever, John, Collected Stories. God, I hate to leave out the Wapshot novels, but these stories are extraordinary.
Didion, Joan, We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live. I encountered Didion’s work when she and John Gregory Dunne were writing for the doomed Saturday Evening Post. Nearly all of her nonfiction is collected here, and Slouching Toward Bethlehem still resonates.
Faulkner, William. The Snopes trilogy. OK, this is cheating. But The Hamlet, The Town, and The Mansion have to be read together.
Garner, Bryan. Garner’s Modern American Usage. So I’m a nerd.
Harris, Marvin. Our Kind. The late anthropologist summed up a career’s worth of insight into human societies in this compilation of concise essays on varied topics. But maybe I should have included Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches instead.
Johnson, Samuel. Lives of the English Poets. I said he was a foundation of modern English biography. Read the essays on Milton (of Paradise Lost, Johnson observed that “no man ever wished it longer”), Dryden, and Pope.
Larkin, Philip, Collected Poems. Even since I bought a copy of High Windows while interviewing for The Sun in 1985, I have been an admirer of Larkin’s quiet, precise, wry poetry.
Nabokox, Vladimir, Pnin. A perfect comic novel, both hilarious and humane.
Trillin, Calvin. The Tummy Trilogy. Another cheat. Alice, Let’s Eat and Tillin’s other books as a happy eater are included in one volume. Enjoy.
Trollope, Anthony. Barchester Towers. I can’t recall how many times I’ve read this novel of life among Anglican clergy in a 19th-century British cathedral town, but it has never failed to give pleasure.
Vidal, Gore. Lincoln. Yes, a novel, but one well informed by current historical scholarship. An absorbing study of the main character, with deliciously malicious takes on the secondary ones.
Waugh, Evelyn. Scoop. Funniest. Novel. About. Newspapering. Ever.
Wilbur, Richard. New and Collected Poems. One of our most literate, polished, and hunorous poets. Oh, the patter song for the syphilitic Dr. Pangloss he wrote for the original Broadway production of Candide: “Columbus and his men, they say, / Conveyed the virus hither, / By which my features rot away / And vital powers wither. / But had they not traversed the seas / And come infected back, / Just think of all the luxuries / That modern life would lack. / All bitter things conduce to sweet, / As this example shows: / Without the little spirochete / We’d have no chocolate to eat, / Nor would tobacco’s frgance greet / The European nose.”*
Fifteen — that’s not nearly enough. I’ve left out Theodore Roethke and Robert Lowell. And Lucky Jim. All of Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe mysteries. Conan Doyle! The Prophet Isaiah. H.L. Mencken’s Days memoirs. Mark Twain. Gatsby! Stupid Facebook meme.
* Forgive me any slips; I’m working from memory.
Monday, May 4, 2009
All right, back to business
Item: A Washington Post article on runoff from power plants contained this sentence:
Plants in Florida, Pennsylvania and several other states have flushed wastewater with levels of selenium and other toxins that far exceed the EPA's freshwater and saltwater standards aimed at protecting aquatic life, according to data the agency has collected over the past few years.
Selenium, like lead and mercury, is an element that is toxic — poisonous. But not all toxic things are toxins. A toxin is a biological poison, like snake venom. The public may well use the terms interchangeably, but a journalist writing on scientific/medical subjects has an obligation to observe such distinctions.
Item: On National Public Radio this morning, a correspondent reported that in the collapse of the dome of the Dallas Cowboys’ practice facility, a coach had injured “a vertebrae.” You may think it absurd that English has retained plural forms of words from Latin. But we go into action with the language we have, not the language we want. Vertebrae, in the Anglicized pronunciation “ver-te-bray,” is a plural, vertebra the singular.
Item: CNN is running a headline, Accused Craigslist killer faces charges in R.I. One of the niceties of professional journalism involves taking care not to convict defendants in advance of trial. Accused killer is a construction that says that we know he is a killer and he has been accused. If it helps to clarify the point for you, recall that during the scandal over sexual abuse of children by the Roman Catholic clergy, the recurring phrase accused priest did not mean accused of being a priest.
Item: If you can come up with anything sillier than the pork producers’ and Israelis’ objecting, out of their several interests, to the term swine flu, You Don’t Say would welcome the contribution.
Item: Whether to describe the euphemism waterboarding (itself a descendant of a previous euphemism, the water cure) as torture has political implications, and one understands a journalistic reluctance to appear to take sides. But at the same time, it is difficult to dodge the conclusion that it is only torture when someone else does it. At the end of the Second World War, the United States convicted Japanese soliders of torturing American prisoners of war with that technique. Let’s be honest.
Plants in Florida, Pennsylvania and several other states have flushed wastewater with levels of selenium and other toxins that far exceed the EPA's freshwater and saltwater standards aimed at protecting aquatic life, according to data the agency has collected over the past few years.
Selenium, like lead and mercury, is an element that is toxic — poisonous. But not all toxic things are toxins. A toxin is a biological poison, like snake venom. The public may well use the terms interchangeably, but a journalist writing on scientific/medical subjects has an obligation to observe such distinctions.
Item: On National Public Radio this morning, a correspondent reported that in the collapse of the dome of the Dallas Cowboys’ practice facility, a coach had injured “a vertebrae.” You may think it absurd that English has retained plural forms of words from Latin. But we go into action with the language we have, not the language we want. Vertebrae, in the Anglicized pronunciation “ver-te-bray,” is a plural, vertebra the singular.
Item: CNN is running a headline, Accused Craigslist killer faces charges in R.I. One of the niceties of professional journalism involves taking care not to convict defendants in advance of trial. Accused killer is a construction that says that we know he is a killer and he has been accused. If it helps to clarify the point for you, recall that during the scandal over sexual abuse of children by the Roman Catholic clergy, the recurring phrase accused priest did not mean accused of being a priest.
Item: If you can come up with anything sillier than the pork producers’ and Israelis’ objecting, out of their several interests, to the term swine flu, You Don’t Say would welcome the contribution.
Item: Whether to describe the euphemism waterboarding (itself a descendant of a previous euphemism, the water cure) as torture has political implications, and one understands a journalistic reluctance to appear to take sides. But at the same time, it is difficult to dodge the conclusion that it is only torture when someone else does it. At the end of the Second World War, the United States convicted Japanese soliders of torturing American prisoners of war with that technique. Let’s be honest.
Yeah, people still read books
Manning the pumps on the copy desk at The Baltimore Sun these last several months did not leave a great deal of leisure for reading. But now, temporarily adrift in a lifeboat, I’m looking forward to three books publishers have sent me:
Michael Malone’s new novel, The Four Corners of the Sky
Patricia T. O’Conner’s Origins of the Specious: Myths and Misconceptions of the English Language
Arika Okrent’s In the Land of Invented Languages: Esperanto Rock Stars, Klingon Poets, and the Mad Dreamers Who Tried to Build a Perfect Language
Watch for comments on them in subsequent posts.
Michael Malone’s new novel, The Four Corners of the Sky
Patricia T. O’Conner’s Origins of the Specious: Myths and Misconceptions of the English Language
Arika Okrent’s In the Land of Invented Languages: Esperanto Rock Stars, Klingon Poets, and the Mad Dreamers Who Tried to Build a Perfect Language
Watch for comments on them in subsequent posts.
Sunday, May 3, 2009
A motto for the Internet age
Foreseen in the 18th century by Lord Chesterfield:
Let blockheads read what blockheads write.
Let blockheads read what blockheads write.
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Many kindnesses
My fellow bloggers Androcass, John Gordon Ross, and Wishydig have all posted kind comments during this week’s upheaval as I departed abruptly from The Baltimore Sun and set up shop at this location. Mr. Ross commented that “his affability, intelligence, humour and tolerance of other viewpoints made that blog exemplary.”* The interesting thing, to my mind, is that I have disagreed with these gentlemen, sometimes sharply.
These aren’t isolated cases. One of my best students from my time as a teaching assistant at Syracuse, Alexander Ackley Recouso, writes for an Internet journal, The Reactionary. The political views he holds aren’t much of a match for the old-line McGovern Democrat who was once his teacher, but we have been in friendly contact for thirty years. I’m proud of him. He has a strong point of view, which he expresses vigorously.
The thing that makes a secular, liberal democracy practicable — and tolerable — is willingness to respect contrary religious, political, and aesthetic views, and to discuss differences in those views with civility. The lack of that respect and civility is what makes the Olberman/O’Reilly bellowing, to take a representative specimen, so tedious and unrewarding. Or to take another, the childish name-calling and abuse that frequently masquerades as discussion on the Internet.
As we proceed on this blog, we will operate on the same principles as in the previous one. If you disagree with anything here, please say so. I do not fear criticism, and I welcome correction. I won’t approve comments that are personal attacks on other people, but you are welcome to attack positions and ideas as vigorously as you like. Also, no one will be faulted for typographical errors or minor lapses in grammar or usage; you shouldn’t be shy about writing.
Before we proceed with further posts, I want to thank many people for many kindnesses during a difficult time. Monty Cook, my editor, to whom fell the duty of discharging me, did so with tact and consideration, and visible reluctance. The many expressions of affection and regard from my former colleagues at The Sun, even as they confronted their own difficulties, were deeply moving. And the comments from my readers, on the old blog and here, many from people who had never posted a comment before, gave me to understand that my work over the years has not been in vain.
So, as we move on, with a photo that Jerry Jackson took as I carted my belongings out of the old building on Calvert Street, I salute you all.
*Don’t think, Mr. Ross, that I failed to notice that all the links in your post were to Wikipedia. Harumph.
**I, too, was a manager, and I understand that when you take the King’s shilling, you have to be prepared to perform disagreeable tasks.
These aren’t isolated cases. One of my best students from my time as a teaching assistant at Syracuse, Alexander Ackley Recouso, writes for an Internet journal, The Reactionary. The political views he holds aren’t much of a match for the old-line McGovern Democrat who was once his teacher, but we have been in friendly contact for thirty years. I’m proud of him. He has a strong point of view, which he expresses vigorously.
The thing that makes a secular, liberal democracy practicable — and tolerable — is willingness to respect contrary religious, political, and aesthetic views, and to discuss differences in those views with civility. The lack of that respect and civility is what makes the Olberman/O’Reilly bellowing, to take a representative specimen, so tedious and unrewarding. Or to take another, the childish name-calling and abuse that frequently masquerades as discussion on the Internet.
As we proceed on this blog, we will operate on the same principles as in the previous one. If you disagree with anything here, please say so. I do not fear criticism, and I welcome correction. I won’t approve comments that are personal attacks on other people, but you are welcome to attack positions and ideas as vigorously as you like. Also, no one will be faulted for typographical errors or minor lapses in grammar or usage; you shouldn’t be shy about writing.
Before we proceed with further posts, I want to thank many people for many kindnesses during a difficult time. Monty Cook, my editor, to whom fell the duty of discharging me, did so with tact and consideration, and visible reluctance. The many expressions of affection and regard from my former colleagues at The Sun, even as they confronted their own difficulties, were deeply moving. And the comments from my readers, on the old blog and here, many from people who had never posted a comment before, gave me to understand that my work over the years has not been in vain.
So, as we move on, with a photo that Jerry Jackson took as I carted my belongings out of the old building on Calvert Street, I salute you all.
*Don’t think, Mr. Ross, that I failed to notice that all the links in your post were to Wikipedia. Harumph.
**I, too, was a manager, and I understand that when you take the King’s shilling, you have to be prepared to perform disagreeable tasks.
Friday, May 1, 2009
That little band of heroes
I’ve been a little distracted over the past few days, and it’s only now that I can get around to reminding you that the American Copy Editors Society is in the middle of its national conference, this year in Minneapolis.
Far from a bunch of creaky old grammar carpers in green eyeshades and sleeve garters, the members are increasingly savvy about electronics. Anyone unable to attend can follow the conference on a Web page or through Twitter.
They are a doughty bunch. About 250 of them showed up this year, I suspect mostly at their own expense, for a comprehensive and concentrated training in the craft. You cannot match the range of expertise anywhere else. And they are doing this in the middle of a recession, with the faltering newspaper industry discarding their members like desperate mariners heaving the cargo overboard.
Twelve years ago, I was at the first national conference, at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Copy editors at that time were, in addition to being anonymous, frequently disregarded and often scorned in their workplaces. Thanks to the founders, Pam Robinson and Hank Glamann, and to the support of some influential figures among the nation’s editors, copy editors found a voice and a platform.
The collegiality, the training, and the morale-building provided by this organization have helped to improve the level of editing at newspapers, magazines, and electronic sites.* It is a bitter irony that just as copy editing was beginning to come into its own, larger forces have questioned the utility and value of editing at all.
I know from thirty years of experience that writers, even the best ones, benefit from editing — need the perspective of that independent set of eyes on their work. And they are getting less and less of that benefit every day, to their cost and to yours, readers.
Newspapers organizations — print-electronic hybrids — are struggling to find a model that will sustain them. Electronic-only journalism is in flux. Organizations like ACES will have to find the means to sustain their mission, and nothing is certain for them. It is not a hospitable landscape.
But for today, and tomorrow, in Minneapolis, two hundred and fifty editors, among them people I have known and respected over the years, are fighting the good fight. I invite you to read what my colleague and friend David Sullivan has to say about this gathering.
And, from a distance, I urge them: Keep the faith.
*As the observant may have noticed in this paragraph, now that I am free of the shackles of Associated Press style, I am reverting to the Oxford comma.
Far from a bunch of creaky old grammar carpers in green eyeshades and sleeve garters, the members are increasingly savvy about electronics. Anyone unable to attend can follow the conference on a Web page or through Twitter.
They are a doughty bunch. About 250 of them showed up this year, I suspect mostly at their own expense, for a comprehensive and concentrated training in the craft. You cannot match the range of expertise anywhere else. And they are doing this in the middle of a recession, with the faltering newspaper industry discarding their members like desperate mariners heaving the cargo overboard.
Twelve years ago, I was at the first national conference, at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Copy editors at that time were, in addition to being anonymous, frequently disregarded and often scorned in their workplaces. Thanks to the founders, Pam Robinson and Hank Glamann, and to the support of some influential figures among the nation’s editors, copy editors found a voice and a platform.
The collegiality, the training, and the morale-building provided by this organization have helped to improve the level of editing at newspapers, magazines, and electronic sites.* It is a bitter irony that just as copy editing was beginning to come into its own, larger forces have questioned the utility and value of editing at all.
I know from thirty years of experience that writers, even the best ones, benefit from editing — need the perspective of that independent set of eyes on their work. And they are getting less and less of that benefit every day, to their cost and to yours, readers.
Newspapers organizations — print-electronic hybrids — are struggling to find a model that will sustain them. Electronic-only journalism is in flux. Organizations like ACES will have to find the means to sustain their mission, and nothing is certain for them. It is not a hospitable landscape.
But for today, and tomorrow, in Minneapolis, two hundred and fifty editors, among them people I have known and respected over the years, are fighting the good fight. I invite you to read what my colleague and friend David Sullivan has to say about this gathering.
And, from a distance, I urge them: Keep the faith.
*As the observant may have noticed in this paragraph, now that I am free of the shackles of Associated Press style, I am reverting to the Oxford comma.
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Turning the page
Welcome to the continuation of You Don’t Say. My somewhat abrupt departure from The Baltimore Sun this week prompted an outpouring of accolades for the blog, and though it is rather vulgar to praise oneself, I would like to repeat a few of them to give you the flavor.
Dan: Please keep us up to date on the future blog... language nerds need a home.
Brian Cubbison: Your good humor, defense of high-quality editing and graceful farewell have been inspiring.
Linz: Your blog has been the only reading material my boyfriend and I shared in two years.
Mark: I would never have anticipated that the ramblings of a copy editor might become one of the blogs I looked forward to the most during my lunchtime browsing at my desk.
Bob: Thanks John for teaching me something new with each of your posts. You're the best kind of teacher: someone who is extremely competent, loves what they do, and who has that rare ability to truly inspire others with their knowledge.
Robert Knilands: Good riddance, John. As I've said for a couple of years, you weren't much more than a caricature.*
Well, enough of panegyric. The second day of unemployment has been busy — administering a final examination to my class at Loyola, making a start on responding to the scores of people who have sent kind words, preparing to celebrate my son’s graduation from St. John’s College in Annapolis in two weeks, and doing preliminary spadework on this blog. I am particularly indebted to my friend and fellow ex-president, Pam Robinson, for giving me the necessary push.
I’m back, and I do not intend to go away.
*I am particularly touched by this one, which is the last comment from Mr. Knilands that you will see at this location.
Dan: Please keep us up to date on the future blog... language nerds need a home.
Brian Cubbison: Your good humor, defense of high-quality editing and graceful farewell have been inspiring.
Linz: Your blog has been the only reading material my boyfriend and I shared in two years.
Mark: I would never have anticipated that the ramblings of a copy editor might become one of the blogs I looked forward to the most during my lunchtime browsing at my desk.
Bob: Thanks John for teaching me something new with each of your posts. You're the best kind of teacher: someone who is extremely competent, loves what they do, and who has that rare ability to truly inspire others with their knowledge.
Robert Knilands: Good riddance, John. As I've said for a couple of years, you weren't much more than a caricature.*
Well, enough of panegyric. The second day of unemployment has been busy — administering a final examination to my class at Loyola, making a start on responding to the scores of people who have sent kind words, preparing to celebrate my son’s graduation from St. John’s College in Annapolis in two weeks, and doing preliminary spadework on this blog. I am particularly indebted to my friend and fellow ex-president, Pam Robinson, for giving me the necessary push.
I’m back, and I do not intend to go away.
*I am particularly touched by this one, which is the last comment from Mr. Knilands that you will see at this location.
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