Tag: writing pet peeves

Writing Pet Peeves #13: All the emojis

John Guillen41 Comments

I’ll be the first person to admit that I use emojis quite a bit. My favorites are probably right in line with most people. I like these three the most 😂😘😕. But I’ve used just about every emoji in my keyboard. But I really only use them when texting my girlfriend. Sometimes in tweets. Sometimes in comments on here. That’s about it. So only a portion of my textual messaging really uses emojis.

But have you ever been or know someone who uses them WAY too much? I remember a friend of mine temporarily getting her sister’s phone and there were more emojis in her conversations than words. Ha! Not only is that ridiculous, but it’s also stupid. And this probably isn’t even a rare occurrence.

I imagine younger teens up to high school kids doing this. My reaction is to pump my fist in the air and proclaim, “THIS MUST STOP!”. Okay. Now people are looking at me like I’m doing something strange. *runs*

Do you know anyone who uses emojis way too often? Do you ever shake them and tell them words need some love too?

Writing Pet Peeves #12: Consistently Wrong

John Guillen4 Comments

I’ve forgotten about this series for a few months, but now it’s making a comeback.

Today I’m discussing something I know just about everyone has encountered. People who are consistently wrong. Don’t forget we’re still talking writing here.

Have you ever found a grammar or spelling error in someone’s writing and then told them about it? Just so they can correct it, at least in the future. Then one of three things happens. They ignore you and the error is bound to happen again. They realize their mistake but make no effort to change anything. Or they’ll experience some sort of “Ohhhhh” moment and that particular error may not happen as often in the future.

In the past when I’ve pointed out a mistake in someone’s writing I’ve rarely experienced the third scenario. Mostly one of the first two. It just makes me scratch my head.

Which of the three examples do you see most often when you point out a mistake in someone’s writing? Or is there a fourth one I didn’t consider?

Writing Pet Peeves #11: Sarcasm

John Guillen23 Comments

This is something that seriously bugs me like no other. When you’re having a nice lighthearted conversation with someone through text on any platform and then you say something sarcastic, and they suddenly think you’re the worst person in the world for what you’ve just said. People sometimes say that sarcasm doesn’t transfer well through text, but no. It transfers just fine.

What happens through text is people acting like they have no idea what’s going on and start responding with “okay” or any sad faced emoji. It’s annoying and it’s the kind of thing to just make me think I’d be better off talking to someone else who catches every sarcastic remark and tosses one back. Or that I’d be better off just not talking to you. Sarcasm isn’t some secret language that is overly difficult to understand, so stop acting like it is.

On this day in 2014 I published Writing by Hand.

Writing Pet Peeves #10: Its/It’s

John Guillen39 Comments

You know, there are a lot of people who misuse words and phrases daily. Just look at Twitter or Facebook. But there are also many people who identify themselves as writers or authors and run a writing blog and misuse those same words all the time.

I don’t particularly care if some random person misuses a word in a Facebook post, on Twitter, or even in a text message. I mean, sure it’s a bit annoying if you are struggling to figure out what they’re trying to say, but it’s not the end of the world. But I do have an issue when I find a blog titled something like “Sarah Michaels – Author” and she doesn’t know when to use its or it’s. And some bloggers I interact with don’t even use the two words correctly. “What is this, amateur hour?” -Ron Burgundy

I’m not even going to give examples of what’s correct and what isn’t because this is something that just about everyone is taught in elementary school at a young age. I find it inexcusable to see people running these writing or author blogs while misusing the simplest words.

What do you think?

On this day in 2014 I published Taking Advice From Other Writers.

 

Writing Pet Peeves #9: Spelling

John Guillen70 Comments

I understand that many people struggle with spelling even the most basic words. I’m no good with math, no big deal there. But generally speaking, someone who’s bad at spelling knows they’re bad at spelling. Which is why it drives me crazy to see people make no real attempt to spell words correctly whenever they write something.

I’m not talking about people who write with acronyms or intentionally shorten words, I’m talking about those who know they’ve likely spelled a word or two or ten incorrectly and refuse to take the extra 30 seconds to verify its spelling. How hard is it to make something you write just a little bit easier to understand?

There are rare occasions in which I’m not 100% sure if I’m spelling a word correctly, and what do I do? I take ten seconds to figure out if I’m right or not. So easy.

On this day in 2014 I published Help Wanted!. Very rarely will I spotlight a single person on here, so read this because that’s exactly what I did last year!

 

Writing Pet Peeves #8: Commas

John Guillen45 Comments

Oh man.

Have you ever, seen sentences, written like this?

No? Lucky you. I have. And each time I just want to grab the person doing the writing and shake them until they never want to put a comma in another sentence again. I understand that a lot of people hate writing. I definitely understand that many are just plain bad writers, but sentences like these are unacceptable.

In what world does that sentence look correct to any individual? And in what world do these people seem to think they were taught this by an educated professional? Heck, a mediocre high school student could teach better than this. I have no idea what goes into writing sentences with commas all over the place, but my guess is that sometimes someone comes up with a sentence and thinks there should be some kind of punctuation. So what do they do? They throw in a few commas to make the sentence more complete.

Or maybe there’s a little alien just on the inside of their heads and he’s trying to communicate a secret message to his motherland that we humans are not supposed to understand? No clue. Just stop with all the commas everywhere. Please.

Writing Pet Peeves #7: Lose/Loose

John Guillen29 Comments

This is another of those mistakes that I’ve only seen since getting on WordPress. During my years in high school and college I never once heard of people mistaking these two words. Never. But the WordPress community has a life of its own and these two words seem to be a major part of it.

I don’t typically see “lose” written in place of “loose.” But I see the other way around ALL the time. And I just want to pull my hair out. I”m really starting to think that everyone on WordPress went to the same school and had the same teacher who never adequately explained some of the mistakes that I see made all the time. Because there are some mistakes that one would expect to be made every so often just as mistakes, but just about every post in this series is a mistake I would not expect to see made over and over again by bloggers who are constantly writing on their blogs. Sure not everyone writes well, but this isn’t about writing well. This is about elementary level mistakes that people seem to be completely unaware of.

I guess I’ll just have to keep “loosing” my mind about it to bring about some change and awareness. Do you ever see these two words used interchangeably?

On this day in 2014 I published Finally Overcoming the Inability to Write.

 

Writing Pet Peeves #6: Apostrophes

John Guillen35 Comments

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Every once in a long while I’ll have to think for an extra second about using an apostrophe correctly. It’s usually when I’ve already written the rest of the sentence so poorly that I almost confuse myself. But again, this is a rare thing.

I remember in kindergarten and first grade being taught how to read. And I remember in second grade being taught how to write cursive and book reports. Somewhere along the line the rules of apostrophes were drilled into my brain. And I’ve never had any issue with them since. Too bad everyone can’t have my experience.

Here are some of the things I see all the time.

Decades written like “1940’s”.

Days of the week written like “Sunday’s”.

Plurals written like “phone’s”.

And so many more. And it’s frustrating. Maybe the education system is to be blamed. Maybe these people didn’t pay attention in English class. Maybe English is the universal second language of the world and no one knows the rules for using apostrophes. Or maybe I’m just going to have to bang my head on my desk for the rest of my life because so many people use apostrophes incorrectly.

On this day in 2014 I published Never Ask a Reader About Their Favorite Book.

 

Writing Pet Peeves #5: Literally

John Guillen29 Comments

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Photo Credit: Cinematic Commentary

I don’t know if I’m going to be able to write this post without banging my head on my desk. This is way up there in terms of the most annoying things people can do around me. Using “literally” for everything, and being wrong every single time.

“I’m so sick I’m literally dying right now.”

“I was literally laughing my ass off.”

“I just ate so much I’m literally going to explode right now.”

GAH! Stop it! My response just about every time someone uses this word wrong is, “I’m literally about to slap you across the face!” I think this is one of those words that will be used incorrectly as long as it’s in use. Why? Because way too many people use it incorrectly and no one corrects them. Sometimes the media or pop culture play a part in words and phrases that are used incorrectly, but I don’t even know how this happened. What I do know is that ever since I was a young kid I’ve constantly heard this misused. I don’t remember any teacher ever correcting a student. And I’ll even admit that I don’t correct people now. Because it’s a lost cause. Ten minutes after I correct someone they’ll use it incorrectly again. Ugh.

In other news, I went ahead and made a new blog! I know I said I wasn’t but I decided it wouldn’t be the end of the world to start fresh. It’s all about sports. It’ll be exactly the same format as this, but sports. My first post and About Me page are already up. So take a look! And follow. Pretty please.

 

Writing Pet Peeves #4: A/An

John Guillen25 Comments

Okay. I have no idea how long ago I was taught when to use “A” versus when to use “An” but it was very early on in my school years. Unfortunately, I’m not going to go into a mini lesson about the two because every person who reaches my blog is well beyond the age at which one should know how to use them. I mean, if you read a sentence out loud that uses one of these words incorrectly it just doesn’t sound right. Let’s try.

“A eagle flew high above the park.”

That sounds wrong. So saying that they both sound correct isn’t even close to being a legitimate excuse. Let’s try one more.

“An girl walked along the busy street.”

Oh my goodness. No. This is ridiculous. I bet some of you are thinking that these two examples are so obvious, but no. Every time one of these two words is used incorrectly the error is so obvious that you just want to kick someone in the shin. Or is that just me?