2006-01-24

Let. It. Die.

.

I'm sick and tired of a certain grammatical gimmick that has been overplayed and y'all have got to stop what I'm about to talk about because it has become even more annoying than overitalicizing.

Actually, it's been a while since I last saw the stylistic quirk I'm about to complain about. I waited for it to die down so before griping so no one (I hope) will take offense. But there is a certain, once-effective grammatical cutesy that has been overused in blogdom to the point where I feel that self-respecting bloggers everywhere must abandon it.

This. Is. It.

It works. It slows the reader down and gives strong emphasis to each word in an important sentence, but when everyone everywhere uses it every post, it certainly gets old fast. Trite even.

So I am glad to see that it seems to have passed out of favor. Someday I may even be able to bear using it, when appropriate.

I'm glad to say I don't see any other effective tools on the verge of becoming obnoxious and I encourage us all, as a community, to see that none do. After all, shooting all the passenger pigeons in 1850 means no messenger pigeon for Thanksgiving 2006. And that is a very sad thought indeed.

Moral: Don't. Shoot. Passenger. Pigeons.

8 comments:

  1. Boy, am I glad I haven't used that on my blog for a good week and a half now. I sure would be embarrassed if I thought this was directed at me.

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  2. Get. Over. Your. Self. What? Do you think the world revolves around you and your preferences? Do. You? Sheesh.

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  3. .

    Well Edgy, you never saw Byuck when it revealed by strict rules on contractions and the various spellings of pretty.

    Rules, I might add, that not even Fobs share. You would think I could expect more of them.

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  4. .

    Oh--and the technique's fine. It's the overuse that bothers me. Sometimes I get sick of the....

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  5. Good use of the four-period terminal elipsis there,Th. Speaking of idiosyncratic strict rules.

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  6. .

    Hey! We both know the Ensign's with me on that one!

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  7. The Ensign being with you is NOT the same as the Force being with you. (In case you were confused on that point.) Because the Force doesn't have people in charge of it who claim to use Chicago and then enforce a few random old rules that they happen to like better.

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  8. .

    What does the force use? I'm guessing MLA.

    ReplyDelete