Dottem » Spelling

Is the Stationery Stationary?

tonjac — Tue, 12 May 2009 23:52:53 +0000

Seth Godin is a very smart man. I read every post and have read many of his books. The rest are on my list. If you want to be smart about your business, pay attention to what he says. I haven’t agreed with every single thing, but everything has made me think about some aspect of interacting in the world today.

While advising you today to ignore sunk costs, he uses an example of something dear to my heart: spelling errors! Specifically, stationary vs. stationery.

Today’s tip:
if you mean the paper that you write notes on, it’s stationery. Remember the E. Paper is for letters. Stationery has an E.

Stationary means standing still.

If the shop owner had remembered this, he could’ve avoided being called out for his failing grade in spelling. But then Seth wouldn’t have such a good example of the need to pay attention to the details, now would he?

Affected by the Twitter Effect

tonjac — Tue, 12 May 2009 00:04:51 +0000

It seems people everywhere are talking about Twitter. I’m not going to belabour it other than to say I love it. I like meeting new people whom I might not meet otherwise. It seems relatively safe. It’s low risk and takes only as much effort as you want to put into it. 140 characters at a time is no big deal. Check it out and say hi – I’m @TonjaC and I can introduce you to some interesting folks.

The other day, though, I witnessed a brief exchange that fit perfectly what I’m doing here.

@limesoothsayer asked for an easy way to remember when to use “affect” and when to use “effect.”

@redrabbit replied “I will affect something and it will have an effect.”

Perfect!

Affect is a verb. Verb=Action. Remember the A. If something is doing something, it’s a verb. It’s action. It’s affecting something, or something is being affected.

Effect is a noun. I don’t have any nifty word games for this one. Sorry. Just remember the A. If it doesn’t apply, then use effect.

(Now, not to confuse you, but there is one way to use “affect” as a noun, but it’s used so rarely that, if you’re planning on using it that way, you already know which one to use.)

Softner

tonjac — Sat, 02 May 2009 05:33:37 +0000

Darn, if you were selling water softeners, I would’ve bought one!

Received this ad in the mail today, on the same page as this one.

Should Of/Should Have

tonjac — Sat, 02 May 2009 05:27:03 +0000

I know, I know.

When you say “I should have …” out loud,

it comes out “I should’ve …”

and it sounds like “I should of …”

But please, PLEASE, don’t put it in print!

This also applies to would have and could have and might have. Just don’t do it!

I received this in the mail today. This ad was on the same page.