my inner grammar geek is an awkward metaphor for the English language // The Text Tag

Thank you Rose @ It's Looking a Bit Mitty and Liz @ Out of Coffee, Out of Mind for tagging me for The Text Tag. I really like this one. It's not your ordinary tag. Not to mention, it wins at alliteration. If your interested in the rules *yawns* follow the links to Rose's or Liz' blog.

1. What is your favorite letter of the alphabet?

A. Not because my name begins with a. I have a story.

I was home-educate and I actually remember when my mom first taught me how to read. She held up the 'a' flash card and told me to repeat 'a' and all of the 82,390 sounds that 'a' makes.

And after 'a' we have 'b'. A simple consonant owning only one sound. Why does our alphabet have to start with one of the hardest letters we have? Why don't we work our way up to the harder ones?

The English language. Who made up this stuff? Were they thinking or did they just slap our alphabet together? I read Beowulf when I was 19. I remember thinking, "This was modern English's predecessor? No wonder we're so messed up." In truth, I adore that book. Beowulf is the best. But the history of the English language, man, it's a gloriously beautiful mess. It's amazing people can articulate with it.

So 'a' is my favorite because it reminds me that despite what a grammar geek I can be our language is rather absurd. Also, life doesn't always have to make sense. (I do need to be reminded of that occasionally.)

2. Three [inserts Four] words that you like?

Odd

Ludicrous

Clever

Dragon 

3. Three words you dislike?

swoon

swooned

has swooned

Oh, was that last one a verb phrase. Pardon me. 

4. If you were to create a word, what would it be and what would it describe?

Um, I'm a fantasy writer, soooo. . . I make up words all the time. More often I make up names. Who wants another name story that is slightly relevant to topic?

So there's this group of elite villains in Oddball the Sequel. One of them is this silent, intimidating guy who's the muscle of the group. Of course, he MUST have a preposterous name. Everyone's terrified of this guy. Even his team members get edgy around him because he never says anything and he could snap your neck in two seconds.

So I named him Pickle.

Which, in retrospect, sounds like a cat name? (My best friend does have a cat named Pickles now that I think of. . .)

So it's perfect!

Ahem. So I didn't actually make up the word "pickle." But I turned it into a name so that counts?

5. Three [inserts Four] favorite punctuation marks?

Quotation marks. I love dialogue. What is a book without conversations?

The ampersand is suave & classy.

Parenthesis. I love witty parenthetical elements. 

The semicolon. I was once told that semicolons are going extinct. We should just start a new sentence instead. But I will always stand by semicolons. A well placed semicolon is thing to be cherished. The author of such a semicolon is to be revered for her/his tactful and meticulous use of punctuation.

6. Three favorite fonts?

I don't think I have three? Whenever I experiment with other fonts, I always fall back to Times New Roman.

7. Do you love writing?

I can't stand writing. Gosh. Why am I even here blogging? Writing bores me to sleep!

Translation:

Why is this a question?

8. What/ who inspired you to start blogging?

Uh, I don't know? I used to be a part of this blog called the Teen Writers Group. (We called ourselves TWiG and Twigians.We were so cute.) We would post our writing and critique each other.

After exiting my teen years, I decided it might be good if I had my own blog? I had no idea what I was doing. But let's face it, I still don't.

 

9. If you could change the way one word sounded it, what word would it be and how would it sound?

I'm just going with Liz' answer because it needs to be a thing. 

"Woman" ought to be pronounced as "majestic warrior queen."

10. Do you know of a word that looks better than it sounds? 

plaid   amnesia   left   aesthetic

It's amazing I even know how to spell these. Oh, and

choir

I always want to swap the 'i' and 'o', because when saying it the 'or' comes at the end. I'm telling you, the English language; it's a funny one. Or I'm just poor at spelling. 

Yeah, that's probably it.

11. What are three [inserts Seven *obvious rebel*] words you mispronounced when you first said them aloud because you only ever read them?

Introduction
At age twelve, I read this aloud to my mom and pronounced like I would "introduce." My mom couldn't believe I had pronounced the "duc" like "duce." But it was because I was thinking of the root word!

Tobias
A fellow book dragon gave me this weird look while we were talking about Divergent.

Allegiant
How even?

Erudite
Maybe it's my tendency to shorten words. . .

Aesthetic
I don't try anymore.

Achilles
My eyes see 'Achilles' and my brain sneezes.

Cello

I can never remember if the 'c' makes a 'k' sound, an 's' sound, or a 'ch' sound. I once used reverse psychology: "No, Ashley. It's said the way you don't think it's supposed to be said." But I've reversed my thinking so often, I don't know anymore.

12. What are three words you used incorrectly in your youth (whether that is last week or eighty years ago, up to you)?

Half the time I talk, I mispronounce words, use the wrong verb tense, or mix my sentence structure to such failure there is no structure. Verbal communication is my weakest point. 

It's worse if I'm passionate about the topic. Kind of like Mr. Knightley ("if I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more"), I can't speak intelligently on things I like and enjoy. I can write pages and pages but when I open my mouth what comes out is, "I really super love that, that THING!" 

It's worse when I'm angry. I don't talk about things I love or things that make me angry. My delivery is so awful that nobody takes me seriously when I try.

Also, I'm always afraid of misusing 'aesthetic.' I like it. Recently it's been thrown around and most people are using the wrong form of it. But I'm not entirely sure myself. Is it an adjective? A noun? Is it both? Or is it just a thing nowadays to use it as both interchangeable? 

In book writing, I use nouns and adjectives as adverbs. You see, you're not supposed to use adverbs, especially the -ly ones. So I keep the word but drop the -ly. Then we end up with an adjective attempting to modify a verb or adverb, which, my friends, is grammatically illegal. 

Don't tell. 

But if we're being fair, "adjective" is a noun. 

 

Take that English language.

I'm not going to add anymore questions as the tag is getting rather long. Nor am I going to tag anyone. But if you want to obsess over grammar and letters, by all means, pick up the tag! I would love to read your post!

Also, I've been considering who I ought to do a Beautiful People post on. I have no clue. Any ideas? Do you want to hear about a particular character?

What is your favorite letter? What are your top three favorite words and what words always cause some kind of trouble for you?