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July 17, 2008: Issue 248

There’s no need for a colon between a preposition and its object, even when the object is a phone number or a Web address.

incorrect: Call our grammar hotline at: 800/472-6626.
correct: Call our grammar hotline at 800/472-6626.

incorrect: Find more great style tips at: SIMStylebook.com.
correct: Find more great style tips at SIMStylebook.com.

Winners: We couldn’t break the tie. They both refused to budge from scissors. So we’re declaring Lacey Howard and Elizabeth Tisinger cochampions of Rock, Paper, Scissors. Each wins a commemorative snow globe.

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July 24, 2008: Issue 249

When you use comparative suffixes, be sure you’re setting up an actual comparison.
If you write a brighter, cleaner look, ask yourself: brighter and cleaner than what?

incorrect: When you shop for kitchen cabinets, consider mahogany. Its rich grain creates a warmer, more welcoming atmosphere.

correct: When you shop for kitchen cabinets, consider mahogany. Its rich grain creates a warm, welcoming atmosphere.

correct: When you shop for kitchen cabinets, consider mahogany. Its rich grain creates a warmer, more welcoming atmosphere than maple or sycamore.

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June 26, 2008: Issue 245

Gum. Hypodermic needles. Toilet paper. Mastheads. Postal ID statements.

Some things should never, ever be reused. Gum, needles, and TP need no explanation. But here’s the deal with mastheads and postal IDs.

They might look the same from issue to issue, but this language changes, and often. If you copy an old masthead, there’s a good chance you’ll get your boss’s boss’s boss’s name or title wrong. While that might be a poor political move, it’s nothing compared to running afoul of postal inspectors.

If you get your postal ID statement wrong, the Postal Service can demand that we reprint the magazine. We’ve had a couple of close calls in the past six months, and the inspectors won’t let it slide again.

Here are the basic rules:
1. Always start with a clean masthead template (ask a CE if you don’t know where to find it) or fresh postal ID language (it’s at BHGStylebook.com/Tools & Resources/Administrative). This goes for every title, including reprints.
2. Don’t work too far ahead. Masthead templates change every four to six weeks, so this is a case where it’s better to wait until a week or so before your Imaging Center date.

If you have any questions, please ask a CE. We’d much rather spend a few minutes explaining the process than spend hours and hours telling Steve Lacy or the U.S. Postal Service why we messed up.

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July 3, 2008: Issue 246

Don’t force your readers to do math. Make ratios as accessible as you can by reducing fractions or converting them to percentages.

awkward: 40 in 2,000 cardiac patients
preferred: 1 in 50 cardiac patients
preferred: 2 percent of cardiac patients

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July 10, 2008: Issue 247

Stylebook cuts red book.
Red book covers heavy book.
Heavy book smashes all others.

When you look up a spelling, start at SIMStylebook.com. Check the main word list first, but don’t forget the specialized word lists in the garden, food, and crafts sections.

If your word isn’t there, go to Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary Eleventh Edition. That’s the one with the red cover. When an entry includes multiple spellings, the first one listed is preferred.

Still no luck? Try Webster’s Third New International Dictionary (unabridged). That’s the back-breaking volume. We have copies in the CE department.

If you still haven’t found the word, you’re dealing with a new coinage or an obscure term. You might want to substitute another word or phrase. Otherwise it’s time for the Oxford English Dictionary or a Web search.

Case study: When we tried to find the spelling of another name for the rock-paper-scissors game, dictionaries were no help. Google turned up rochambeau, roshambo, and ro-sham-bo. Rochambeau got the most hits, but many of those were references to an 18th-century French count. Roshambo came in a solid second, and besides, that’s how the World RPS Society spells it. So we’ll go with that.

Yes, they really exist: Check out the World RPS Society (“Serving the needs of decision makers since 1918”).

Contest: Rock, paper, or scissors? E-mail us by 5 p.m. Friday, and your entries will battle it out for a prize.

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June 5, 2008: Issue 242

This is why they’re state troopers and not grammar cops.

What’s wrong with this picture? The two sentences aren’t parallel, so are doesn’t refer back to anything. (We are what? We are watch?)

They could fix the problem this way:

Are you watching your speed? We are.

But that puts an awful lot of words on the billboard. Here’s an easier fix:

Now that I’ve pointed this out, I’ll welcome donations to defray the cost of my inevitable speeding tickets.

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June 12, 2008: Issue 243

To prevent the appearance of cultural or religious bias, avoid B.C. and A.D. in dates.

Any year in the past two millennia doesn’t need a qualifier.
acceptable: The city was first settled around 1050 A.D.
preferred: The city was first settled around 1050.

If you’re worried about confusion, add “the year.”
acceptable: By 500 A.D., the Byzantine style had taken hold.
preferred: By the year 500, the Byzantine style had taken hold.

For earlier dates, try establishing them in relation to today, rather than in relation to the birth  of Christ.
acceptable: Residents of Crete began cultivating olives around 5,000 B.C.
preferred: Residents of Crete began cultivating olives about 7,000 years ago.

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May 8, 2008: Issue 238

What do you do when you accidentally launch PowerPoint instead of Entourage? Grab a cup of coffee and a Zinger while you wait for the rainbow wheel to stop spinning and the icon to stop bouncing so you can quit PowerPoint? Well, OK—if you need the caffeine and sugar.

But you can quit an application while it’s still launching: Hold down the Control key while you click on the icon in your dock.

Control-click can get you out of other trouble, too. For one thing, it will let you force-quit a frozen application, or exit an application in the middle of a task. It will also give you access to recently opened documents in most programs. Give it a try next time you’re not sure what to do; the option you need might pop up.

The one that we want: After last week’s issue, we were accused of hating animals. (“I bet you cheered when Bambi’s mother died,” as Jeff Myers gently put it.) We adore animals, and we have the furry furniture and chewed-up shoes to prove it. But we apologize if our little pronoun rule offended any card-carrying members of the ASPCA. Here’s our peace offering.

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May 15, 2008: Issue 239

Always spell-check a story before it leaves your desk, whether it’s in Microsoft Word or InDesign. Spell-check will catch misspellings, typos, and duplicate words that can easily slip past you, especially if you’ve seen the story before. Spell-check will also help you spot inconsistent names and missing first references.

Like all powerful tools, though, spell-check must be used carefully. Beware of the “replace all” command. (We’ve used this example before, but type “frounceen orange juice” into Google to see just how much trouble this function can cause.)

And remember there are some things spell-check can’t do for you. It won’t flag a through that should have been thorough, for instance. Spell-check is there to help you do your job, not to do the job for you.

Contest: The spell-check in pagination software at a company where I used to work always tried to change my name to Elizabeth Kissed Sidereal. InDesign’s spell-check wants to turn Eliot Nusbaum into Eliot Unusable and Greg Kayko into Greg Kooky. What’s the goofiest spelling suggestion you’ve seen? E-mail us. Our favorite wins a prize.

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April 17, 2008: Issue 235

A casual synonym for yes is yeah, pronounced with a short a sound (like yak without the k on the end): Yeah, the pink walls and green counters had to go.

A positive response to a roll call vote is yea, pronounced with a long a (rhymes with way): The yeas have it; we’re adjourning for lunch.

Yea is also the spelling of the cheer: Yea, the Jayhawks won the championship!

Yay is not a word, according to Webster’s dictionaries.

(Thanks to Molly Reid Sinnett, who asked this question and who promised to bring us treats if we gratuitously mentioned the Kansas win.)

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