Bloody Well Write

“Got to, got to get us some elbowroom.”

That’s a line from the 1970s’ classic Schoolhouse Rock series of educational short films that helped shape a generation.

The thing is, though, when you go to YouTube to watch this particular film, the headline reads, School house Rock — Elbow Room. The word suggesting a certain amount of personal space — elbowroom — is written as two words (and School house should really be Schoolhouse — aargh!).

That’s no good.

I jest — sort of. When Schoolhouse Rock was in its prime, elbowroom may very well have been spelled with two words, as it’s been around since the 1500s. And most students of the English language know that words with compound qualities often started out as two words, then perhaps migrated to a hyphenated word (or not) before becoming a single word. These same students also know that this is a language of movement. And they also know that any change that occurs in this fabulous language also happens at a snail’s pace.

So elbowroom is now in several respected dictionaries (Webster’s New World College among them). But what about other -room words?

A plethora (OK, “Three Amigos” was just on the tube, so sue me) of -room concepts have made the migration to single word-dom. Examples include:

• Barroom
• Bathroom
• Boardroom (think Donald Trump)
• Classroom
• Courtroom
• Darkroom
• Greenroom
• Headroom
• Homeroom
• Legroom
• Lunchroom
• Mudroom
• Newsroom
• Playroom
• Restroom
• Stateroom
• Stockroom
• Sunroom
• Taproom
• Toolroom
• Washroom
• Workroom

And that’s just a partial list. But what about break room? How long does it have to be the red-haired stepchild of the -room family? Its function is similar to the lunchroom; it has just two syllables, making it a prime candidate for one-word status; and it wouldn’t confuse many people by making it one word. What gives? Come on, Merriam-Webster. Get with it, Webster’s New World College. Get on board, AP Stylebook. Breakroom is the way to go.

But don’t quote me on that until it becomes official, folks, for as much as I like improving the language for the sake of good sense, I also tend to follow rules. So until that little miracle happens, continue to use break room.

Other groups of words fit into this two-words-left-behind scenario, such as chat room (a relatively young word), clean room (a room that is kept exceptionally clean and free of dust, debris, etc., in order to manufacture or assemble objects) and great room (another relatively new term referring to space in the house where people tend to hang out because it serves several functions). But those, my friends, are for another day.

Happy trails!

SAK

A friend of mine has a dog — and an extraordinarily adorable one at that — named Google. This same friend is also the technology teacher at a local middle school. The dog’s name, then, makes even more sense, yes?

So when this friend asked me the proper way to spell the word that implies the action of looking something up on the popular search engine named Google (and then suggested that it could make a decent blog topic — smart friend), I just had to help.

Google, the ridiculously cute pup (photo: courtesy of Google's owner-mom)

So how do you spell it? Depending on your phrasing, there are a few ways to get your point across:

• He is going to Google “How to use a neti pot” whenever his sinuses start to flare up.
• I Googled the movie times for “Eat, Pray, Love” — so excited to see it.
• She found a groovy pair of blue beaded sandals by Googling them — and they were available in her size.

Notice that the final “e” remains in the first two examples but gets dropped when the suffix -ing gets added. (It’s Googling, not Googleing.) Note, too, that all instances use an uppercase “G” in the initial position. According to the newest AP Stylebook, it’s Google when you’re talking about the company and search engine, indeed, but it’s also Google when you’re employing a verb. Same goes for Googled and Googling. One day, all references (save the company name, search engine and awesome dog) may be lowercased, but that day has yet to come.

Don’t just take my word for it; why don’t you Google it for yourself?

Happy trails!

SAK

Here’s a short and hopefully painless post for your quick-reading pleasure.

What is a whipsaw?

A whipsaw is a two-handled saw that dates back to the 1400s. It can be smallish or it can be big enough to cut down large tree. The idea is this: A cutting job that takes enough effort for two people could be made easier if two people actually do the cutting. Most whipsaws average 6 feet in length.

A whipsaw humorously reminds me of the pushmipullyu (a two-headed animal that is part gazelle, part unicorn) from the “Dr. Doolittle” story — when one head moves, the other head instinctively moves in the opposite direction. It’s all about teamwork, my friends.

A whipsaw (photo: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Two_man_saw.JPG)

Alternatively, Webster’s New World College Dictionary (which the AP Stylebook folks regard as the end-all-be-all of dictionaries) also shows two transitive verb meanings for whipsaw:

1. to cut with a whipsaw
2. to defeat or get the best of (a person) two ways at once, as, in faro, by winning two different bets in a single play

So, in other words, they gotcha coming and going.

And for the movie buffs, “Whipsaw” is a 1936 film with Myrna Loy and Spencer Tracy, about an under-cover detective who is supposed to bring in a beguiling jewelry thief and her cohorts. Guess who fall in love?

Happy trails!

SAK

I never thought about it before I became a proofreader more than a decade ago. I’d venture to guess that most people don’t think about it, either, or ever will. And yet now that I know the difference, it bugs me enough to write an entry on it.

On what?

On the copyright symbol — © — and the redundant use of the word copyright alongside the symbol.

If you look at the copyright information on just about anything, you may very well see something like this:

Copyright © 1989, 1996 by  …. (This particular instance is from the parenting book “What to Expect the First Year.”)

The problem with the above information is that it is repeating the idea of copyright: the word, then the symbol. It’s akin to  “I’d like $40 dollars, please.” The dollar sign ($) and the word dollars mean exactly the same thing, so if you said it out loud, you’d say, “I’d like dollars 40 dollars, please.” You see the ick factor, grammatically speaking, yes?

So, regarding the copyright issue, two correct ways to write it would be, in the “What to Expect the First Year” example:

Copyright 1989, 1996 by …

or

© 1989, 1996 by …

This singular copyright construction also aligns with AP Stylebook conventions. And that, as you faithful Bloody Well Write readers know, makes the world right as far as I’m concerned.

My preference is the second option, mainly because symbols are, well, cute. Symbols make phrases look somehow more professional, more acceptable. They also take up less space than the word or words they symbolize, and that often comes in handy when you’re limited with space issues.

Happy trails!

SAK

I love reading to my kids. No matter what else happened that day — good or bad — and no matter how many times I reprimanded them throughout the day, at the dinner table or while getting ready for bed, that time spent snuggling head to head, cheek to cheek, shoulder to shoulder while flipping through a book that we’ve read 67 times before is, as they say, priceless.

And that doesn’t even include all the weird mistakes we find in said books. They’re real gems, those mistakes.

Tonight’s story was P.D. Eastman’s “Go, Dog. Go!” It’s especially fun for a word nerd like me because I get to point out three types of punctuation in the title alone, and I get such a thrill when my 4-year-old exclaims, “Explanation point, Mom! I found one!”

She makes me so proud.

But something always bugged me about the wording inside. There are two dogs, one male and one female, who periodically meet throughout the book. Both dogs wear various hats. The girl dog asks the boy dog if he likes her hat, and he always says some version of “No, I don’t like that hat.” So they part, the girl dog looking miffed and the boy dog looking oblivious. The last meeting ends amicably because the girl dog has gone all out — and I mean all out — in designing her hat; the boy dog finally agrees that her hat is pretty cool.

Do you like my hat? (photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/table4five/4067671771/)

What got me, though, was how Eastman spelled good-by (without an ending “e”). It just doesn’t look right to me. And when that happens, that not-quite-right feeling, it’s best if I just look it up. And of course I did, but it took more than a year to do it (sort of like how I go into the kitchen with the intention of getting a glass of water but find dirty dishes in the sink, so I wash them and then realize that I need some bleach to clean up and go downstairs to get it but see an unfolded blanket in the living room, so I go ahead and fold it first, but then … you get the picture).

So I looked it up via Merriam-Webster. And I found good-bye (with a final “e”) to be the first (and thus most prominent) spelling. While good-by made the dictionary’s second spelling, it is still considered a variant.

And then I checked it out in the brand-spanking-new 2010 AP Stylebook (feel free to envy me) and, within those magical pages, goodbye exists, sans hyphen! Now that, my friends, made my day.

So goodbye it is, arrivederci,  auf wiedersehen and don’t let the door hit you on the way out.

Happy trails!

SAK

This one has been bugging me for years — decades perhaps. Lo and behold, my mom asked me the other day how data is supposed to be pronounced, and I thought that it’s time I do an entry on it. So here goes.

My gut instinct was that data (sounds like DAY-tah) is the more common usage and, since the AP Stylebook tends to change such things as spellings and pronunciations based on frequency of use, it would probably choose to say DAY-tah.

My other gut instinct was that data (sounds like DA-tah, which slightly rhymes with batter, hatter, tatter) is the more technical usage, one that only scientists and English professors preferred.

Mad scientists don't need data to prove their madness (photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/moria/232256824/)

So to research this little gem, I went to Merriam-Webster for clarification. The site has a pronunciation function that allows your computer to talk to you so that you can hear exactly what the word should sound like. And what do you think I found? Two little icons to click on. That means that the first icon (the one on the left) is the prominent, preferred American pronunciation. The one on the right is also acceptable, but it is more like the understudy to the left pronunciation, as well as being the British preference.

So. Data. What’s your guess? I hope that your guess was my guess, because then you’d be correct. Merriam-Webster lists DAY-tah as the primary pronunciation.

Problem solved.

Then there’s the issue of whether data deserves a singular or plural verb attached to it. But you know what? It’s Friday at beer:thirty and that’s a topic for another day — happy weekend to all you data hounds.

Happy trails!

SAK

Yet another recent style change — or change back — from the AP Stylebook folks concerns the abbreviation of microphone. Back in March ‘10, the AP folks put it out there: The abbreviation that used to be mic would henceforth be mike.

No one could hear the announcement over the roar of the crowd.

According to Slate Magazine, the broadcast wing of the AP raised a hullabaloo fierce enough to cause AP to reverse that decision.

Hey, Mike: Is this thing on? (photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/snackerdesigns/4221001947/)

I’m torn.

To me, the abbreviation should, indeed, have fewer of the same letters as the original word, but not different letters (such as mike — ain’t no no k in microphone). But the three-letter mic looks like it should sound like mick (or Mick). Beside the fact that mike with a lowercase m is slightly weird, I was going to be OK with the change; after all, other words that are proper nouns are also regular ol’ nouns — think of Pat/pat, Bob/bob, Art/art and Bill/bill. I even know a few elementary school jokes that say as much.

Then again, if you’re riding around your neighborhood on a bicycle (sans the letter k), you’re on your bike and not your  bic. (What? You are on a bic? Now that would be something to see. Or not.)

This is why I defer to the AP Stylebook on most cases.

So for the record, it’s currently mic for microphone.

Happy trails!

SAK

Yet another good thing to come out of the AP Stylebook folks’ ponderings of the English language is their recent decision to, well, not make a decision.

This particular point revolves around state names in print. Should they be abbreviated when in conjunction with cities? Or should they be spelled out, creating havoc for newspapers and any other organization that deals with skinny columns or persnickety designers?

The AP Stylebook editors had recently stated that the new rule was to spell out state names. But according to its Twitter account (who would’ve thought that Twitter would be a viable news source?), the Associated Press editors are now “postponing plans to change its style on state abbreviations, pending further review.”

Check out the misspelling that runs across the bottom of this political ad — ouchie!

I, along with many, many, many other editors and writers, am happy that they are rethinking that change. Living in Kansas, I don’t have as many opportunities to write about Mississippi or Massachusetts, but spelling out those extra letters seems like overkill.

Any thoughts out there about this change (or this non-change)?

Happy trails!

SAK

I think hell just froze over.

This just in (OK, about an hour ago, so sue me), directly from the Twitter page of @APStylebook:

Responding to reader input, we are changing Web site to website.

Make note, news and grammar buffs, because the AP Stylebook folks have finally caved to overwhelming public pressure. It happens less frequently than a blue moon, but it just happened. It’s a good thing, but I’m going to have to wrap my brain around this (or perhaps rap my brain). You know how hard old habits die.

Happy trails!

SAK

Thank the gods for a husband who gives you topic after topic for your silly grammar blog.

Not sure what prompted him to think of it (and frankly, I don’t care — I just took it and ran), but my other half thought that I should write about a bald-faced lie versus a bold-faced lie. And wouldn’t you know it, there’s a third suspect in this mess, barefaced lie, and you know what that means: complication!

No, not really. It all makes good sense. Here’s the deal.

William Shakespeare: neither barefaced nor (100 percent) bald, but bold nonetheless (photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/baronbrian/4139672758)

Barefaced lie

This is the mother of them all. Dating back to the late 1500s, barefaced started out as a very literal beast. If you had an uncovered face — no mask, no veil, no whiskers — you were barefaced. This very literal meaning easily transformed into the more figurative, eyebrow-raising barefaced lie: Someone who told a barefaced lie was doing so in a very open, unconcealed manner, as if hiding the truth were the last thing on the liar’s mind (quite the cocky son of a gun). Barefaced lie is still the preferred term in Britain.

Bald-faced lie

One theory about the origins of bald-faced lie is that bald and bald-faced were already quite popular in the lexicon of the English speaker. Consider bald eagle, bald mountain and bald-faced (as in an animal with a white face or white mark on its head). Perhaps, the thinking goes, it was just inevitable that the language would evolve toward bald-faced as opposed to barefaced.

Of course, it’s no stretch of the imagination to think that a bald face is quite the same as a bare face, so what’s the big stink? An interesting side note is that Merriam-Webster’s Online Dictionary only dates bald-faced back to 1943.

Bold-faced lie

Merriam-Webster dates bold-faced back to 1591 (just one year later than its date for barefaced). Its main definition refers to a shamelessness or impudent manner, one in which putting forth a bold face — along with a devil-may-care attitude — makes absolute sense.

Another way to look at a bold-faced lie is to think of words in print. If something has been bold-faced, it has been done so for emphasis. This is not the primary (nor most accepted) meaning, though, so I wouldn’t go around telling your friends that you know something they don’t, na-nee-na-nee-boo-boo.

To complicate things even more, my cherished AP Stylebook makes no mention of any of the variations.

So what’s my recommendation? I’d say that barefaced is a solid choice, as it’s the first and most popular option, especially for the Brits. If it sounds too odd for your delicate ear, go for bold-faced; if William Shakespeare could use it, so can you. And if that’s not the answer you were looking for, try bald-faced; the English language is always evolving, so why not go with the flow?

Just trying to be accommodating — and that’s no lie.

Happy trails!

SAK