Editor's Corner

As promised, today I will review the second role that adverbs can play in grammar: adverbs modifying adjectives. Here are some examples of adverbs (in italics) modifying adjectives (in bold):

· She demonstrated an extremely warped sense of humor.

· Tim solved a horribly frustrating puzzle.

· I ate the deliciously crusty ciabatta.

· Sinbad’s foot touched a painfully sharp barnacle.

These adverbs must stay next to the adjectives they modify, unlike the adverbs that modified verbs. To test the phrase and figure out if the adverb is modifying an adjective, try reading the sentence with the adverb alone. It doesn’t work when you remove the adjective from the pair. For example:

· She demonstrated an extremely sense of humor.

· Tim solved a horribly puzzle.

· I ate the deliciously ciabatta.

· Sinbad’s foot touched a painfully barnacle.

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

Happy Groundhog Day!

We left off the other day with adverbs modifying verbs. Before I tell you about adverbs that modify adjectives, I have a hint to help you figure out if a word is an adverb modifying a verb.

According to The McGraw-Hill Handbook of English Grammar and Usage, “If a word can be moved to a different position in the sentence, then the word is an adverb that modifies the verb.” Let’s see how this works (verbs bolded, adverbs italicized):

Original

· He built the go-cart carefully.

Adverb moved

· He carefully built the go-cart.

Original

· I spoke to the groundhog candidly.

Adverb moved

· Candidly, I spoke to the groundhog.

· I candidly spoke to the groundhog.

Original

· I dyed my dog’s hair yesterday.

Adverb moved

· Yesterday, I dyed my dog’s hair.

Original

· Doug borrows my car frequently.

Adverb moved

· Doug frequently borrows my car.

· Frequently, Doug borrows my car.

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

619-542-6773 | Ext: 766773

www.symitar.com

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Last Friday I introduced you to aptanagrams. Today we have something called antigrams, from chapter 2 (pp. 5-6) of Tyrannosaurus Lex: The Marvelous Book of Palindromes, Anagrams, & Other Delightful & Outrageous Wordplay, by Rod L. Evans, Ph.D. Here is an explanation of antigrams, along with selected examples:

When the letters of words or phrases are rearranged to form words or phrase opposite in meaning (antonyms), antigrams result. Because it is easier to find words related in meaning to other words than words that carry contrary or opposite meanings, antigrams are rarer than apt anagrams. One of the most famous antigrams is Santa/Satan. Some of the following examples have contrasting rather than opposite meanings.

antagonist ≠ not against

demoniacal ≠ a docile man

diplomacy ≠ mad policy

dormitories ≠ tidier rooms

earliest ≠ rise late

filled ≠ ill-fed

forty-five ≠ over fifty

honorees ≠ no heroes

mentors ≠ monster

militarism ≠ i limit arms

restful ≠ fluster

sweltering heat ≠ the winter gales

teacher ≠ cheater

within earshot ≠ i won’t hear this

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

619-542-6773 | Ext: 766773

www.symitar.com

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This one’s for you, John Thomas!

Today’s topic is adverbs. Most of you know that adverbs modify verbs, but did you know they also modify adjectives and other adverbs? Well, let’s start with what we know: adverbs modify verbs.

The following examples show adverbs (italic) modifying verbs (bold):

· Marie is moving slowly.

· Brenda regarded him quizzically.

· I painted butterfly pictures yesterday.

· They go to concerts frequently.

· Joe Baldocky jumped out of the freezing water quickly.

Adverbs answer these questions:

· When? (She arrived today.)

· Where? (He put the pacifier there.)

· How? (Melvin shucked the corn slowly.)

· How often? (Beatrice washes her hair daily.)

And now, my apologies for the poor quality of this video—it looks every bit of its <cough> 41 years—but I can’t send you off without the Schoolhouse Rock Lolly adverb song.

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Dear Editrix,

Please cover the difference between a lot, alot, and allot.

Sincerely,

Lost with Lots

Dear Lost,

Here are some definitions for you:

· a lot: A great deal of something; an abundance.

· a lot: A place you park your car. If vacant, a place to play ball or get in trouble with your parents by getting into all kinds of shenanigans.

· allot: To assign a portion to; allocate.

· alot: This is not a word.

Sincerely,

Editrix

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

We’re back with adjectives for one more day. Today we’ll cover descriptive adjectives, which shouldn’t be so tough. Descriptive adjectives are what most of us probably think of when we are playing Mad Libs: chewy, furry, green, shiny, angry, sultry, sandy, vicious, despicable, pretty, etc.

Here’s the thing to remember about descriptive adjectives: they have comparative and superlative forms. In the following examples, the adjectives are bolded:

Comparative

The taffy Jane makes is chewier than my aunt’s taffy.

Jim’s chest is furrier than Sam’s.

Chihuahuas are more vicious than other dogs when protecting their chicken bones.

Superlative

The taffy that Jane makes is the chewiest that I’ve ever eaten.

Jim has the furriest chest in town; he won the Alameda County Sasquatch trophy three years in a row.

Chihuahuas are the most vicious dogs known to humans.

You’ll notice in the examples above that sometimes descriptive adjectives are formed by adding more or most before the adjective. According to The McGraw-Hill Handbook of English Grammar and Usage, the two patterns used to form the comparative and superlative depend partly on the word’s history and partly on the word’s length. Some two-syllable words (especially from French) and all three-syllable (or longer) adjectives follow the more/most pattern. The patterns are as follows:

You can combine descriptive adjectives, though there are rules about when to use and when not to use commas. More on that later. If you can’t wait, we did cover it in the past here: https://episystechpubs.com/2014/02/18/editors-corner-commas-adjectives-and-some-crazy-rules/

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

619-542-6773 | Ext: 766773

www.symitar.com

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Good morning! I hope you all enjoyed a splendid weekend wherever you were. Let’s start where we left off on Thursday, with adjectives. We are going to categorize adjectives today in ways you never dreamed possible. According to our handy-dandy textbook, The McGraw-Hill Handbook of English Grammar and Usage:

Adjectives can be subdivided into two main classes: determiners and descriptive adjectives.

Today we’re going to concentrate on determiners. Determiners are further classified into different groups, but they have one thing in common. They always come before descriptive adjectives. Here are five of the subclasses and examples:

· articles: the, a, an (Note: Articles are sometimes considered separately as their own part of speech.)

· demonstratives: this, that, these, those

· number words:

o cardinal numbers: one, two, three

o ordinal numbers: first, second, third

o words indicating order: first, last, middle

· possessives used as adjectives:

o Chico’s (dog), Buster’s (yard)

o (possessive pronouns): his, their, our, its, her

· quantifiers: few, some, several, many

Now together with a descriptive adjective, you can see that these must always come before the descriptive adjective and noun. Here are a few examples, with the determiners in italics and the descriptive adjectives in bold:

· the first pickled pepper

· that piglet’s stinky sty

· a few wrinkly sheets

As you can see, the determiners must come first. It is incorrect to say “stinky piglet’s that sty.”

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

It’s Friday, a day for fun! I know, I unpacked our adjectives yesterday, but those can wait until Monday. I have a new book to share with you called Tyrannosaurus Lex: The Marvelous Book of Palindromes, Anagrams, & Other Delightful & Outrageous Wordplay, by Rod L. Evans, Ph.D. (I believe Mr. Evans was paid by the word for that title!)

From the introduction of the Aptanagrams (Chapter 1):

Whole words can be hidden in other words by rearranging their letters, as when news becomes sewn. Such transformations are called anagrams, and aptanagram (ap-TAN-uh-gram) can be used to describe an anagram of an extraordinary kind. As its name suggests, it’s an anagram that forms an apt word (phrase or sentence).

For your Friday viewing pleasure, I have selected some of the more clever, less offensive items from this collection.

a decimal point = I’m a dot in place

a shoplifter = has to pilfer

A stitch in time saves nine = Is this meant as incentive?

angered = enraged

asteroid threats = disaster to Earth

Clint Eastwood = old west action

considerate = care is noted

conversation = voices rant on

dormitory = dirty room

election results = lie, let’s recount

eleven + two = twelve + one

fir cones = conifers

hibernates = the bear’s in

punishment = nine thumps

rats and mice = in cat’s dream

the eyes = they see

Western Union = no wire unsent

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

619-542-6773 | Ext: 766773

www.symitar.com

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Today I introduce you to our third part of speech: adjectives.

· The first role of adjectives is to modify nouns. When adjectives modify nouns they come before the noun.

Examples (the adjectives are in bold, the nouns are italicized):

o big, hairy toe

o auburn curls

o vicious hamster

· The second role is as predicate adjectives. What the heck are predicate adjectives, you ask? These are adjectives that modify the linking verbs we talked about. (The “predicate” is the part of the sentence that contains the verb.) As stated in The McGraw-Hill Handbook of English Grammar and Usage, “As predicate adjectives, adjectives follow linking (descriptive) verbs and describe the subject.”

Examples (the predicate adjectives are in bold, the verb is italicized):

o The breadsmelled delicious.

o Charlie is happy.

o The caterpillarbecame restless.

We are going to concentrate on adjectives that modify nouns for the next day or so. Until then, I have another trip down memory lane for you with Schoolhouse Rock.

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

619-542-6773 | Ext: 766773

www.symitar.com

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Let’s continue from where we left off yesterday. I think it was the swamp of verbs and The McGraw-Hill Handbook of English Grammar and Usage definition and examples:

The defining characteristic of all verbs is that verbs (and only verbs) have tenses: present, past, and future. Unless a word can be used in the present, past, and future tense, it is not a verb—no exceptions. Verbs come in two flavors: regular and irregular. Regular verbs form their past tenses in an absolutely regular way by adding –ed (sometimes just –d if the verb already ends in an e). Irregular verbs form their past tense in some other irregular way, often by changing the vowel of the verb.

Examples:

Present: Wilbur always remembers his mother’s birthday.

Orville always forgets his mother’s birthday.

Past: Wilbur remembered his mother’s birthday this year.

Orville forgot his mother’s birthday this year.

Future: Wilbur will remember his mother’s birthday this year.

Orville will forget his mother’s birthday this year.

The Will Test for Verbs

If you can put will in front of a word and the result is grammatical, then that word must be a verb.

Ah-ha! Another handy test to see what part of speech a word is being used for. Let’s test some examples:

Initial sentences:

· He planted a row of strawberries.

· I row to Bainbridge Island every morning.

Applying the Will Test for Verbs:

· He planted a (will) row of strawberries. (Sounds horrible. In this case, row is a noun.)

· I (will) row to Bainbridge Island every morning. (That works! In this case, row is a verb.)

http://www.gocomics.com/nonsequitur/2015/01/13 Thanks for sending this, Kathy S.!

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory