My Lynne Truss moment

Well, I finally did it. I committed a public act of apostrophe correction. I couldn't help myself. I had the means, the opportunity, the motive.

Someone innocently handed me a sign to hold while she went searching for tape at the church picnic. I looked at the sign. In purple foam letters, it said, "KIDS GAMES." Arrrrgh. I spied a purple marker nearby. I could just borrow it for a minute and put it back. No harm would come to anyone. I quickly decided to make my move. I grabbed the marker. No one made a move to stop me. I breathlessly added the apostrophe after "KIDS." Much better. One battle won. It felt good. After all, I'd left the DESERTS sign alone. There was no saving that one. No way to squeeze in another S among the foam letters.

And I had kept quiet about a certain sign at A Local Franchise That Shall Remain Nameless. They had put an apostrophe in the word "WANTS" on a sign. I had to stop myself from physically removing the plastic apostrophe from the sign outside. I guess it was only a matter of time before I acted on my punctuation vigilante impulses.

If anyone doesn't know who Lynne Truss is, I'll gladly explain. She is the hilarious author of the book, "Eats, Shoots and Leaves." The subtitle of the book is "The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation." The title is based on the story about how a misplaced comma can mean the difference between a panda munching on shoots and a panda firing a gun. Lynne writes about her own struggles with the urge to correct punctuation errors. The book jacket has a photo of her with a marker in her hand. She has this mischievous expression on her face as her hand hovers over the place where the apostrophe should be on a poster for the film "Two Weeks Notice." She's a rock star in my book.

Those who think this kind of stuff doesn't matter should consider what could happen if everyone started following their own rules for punctuation. Clarity would suffer, instructions would be misunderstood and anarchy could ensue.

Number people might be a little more sympathetic to the word people's cause if they had to look at incorrect equations on a regular basis. They'd be scratching their heads and saying things like, "Don't they know that doesn't add up?" and, "It's wrong. I just know it is. I wish I had a marker."

Lessons in the weeds

Job seekers could learn a lot from weeds. They are resilient and strong. They are continually rejected, yet they return. When one area is not suitable for growth, they find another. When the roots are deep, they can keep growing, even if the top is cut off. They do better when growing among other plants. When they stand alone, they are more likely to fail. They spread out, looking for more opportunities to grow.

Great words or phrases in unexpected places

It's always fun when a great word or phrase pops up in song lyrics. Say what you will about Alanis Morissette, but she has a bigger vocabulary than most singers. She also has a way of putting words together that most people wouldn't. I find that refreshing.

Example: In 1995's wildly successful Jagged Little Pill, she has this great line in the song "Head Over Feet." The line is: "You held your breath/and the door for me." I love that.

A bit later in her career, she got more sophisticated, using words like "vacillated," "ambivalence," "reticence" and "archaic" on her 2002 cd, Under Rug Swept. Some more good lines on that cd: "I'm working my way toward our union mended." (from the song "A Man") and "That particular month, we needed time to marinate in what 'us' meant." (from the song "That Particular Time").

I do miss getting liner notes when I download mp3s. Does anyone else miss them?

"You should have a blog."

All my life, people have been telling me I should write a book. Now they tell me I should write a blog. I finally caved. Here it is.

I was writing before I could write. I used to scribble on papers and pretend that the scribbles were words. I think I ruined a few books that way. I was fascinated by the idea that words from my head could be put on paper for others to read. I was the weird kid who liked to diagram sentences while the rest of the class groaned.

When I was thinking of a title for my blog, I wanted something that wouldn't limit me to any one topic. I'm interested in a lot of things, for starters: finance, figure skating, punctuation and pop culture.

I've always been a quiet person. A byproduct of this is that you learn more when your mouth is shut. Observations I collected found their way into poems, stories and journal entries as a kid. When I finished college and got a job writing for a newspaper, I was paid for my observations. Wow. Someone paid me to write about what I saw and heard.

Now I have the chance to write about whatever I want. No editors. No assignments. I'm writing for fun. Even if nobody reads this, I'll enjoy it.

I decided on this blog title because it didn't limit me and it expressed the way I feel about writing. Vitamins promote health and long life. That's what writing does for me -- and probably for lots of other writers. A daily dose of it is good for a writer, but word people don't look at it as a chore. It's enjoyable, satisfying. Writers savor a well-written sentence like a foodie savors a well-prepared meal. We enjoy the taste of it. We delight in how the words feel on the tongue.

This should be fun. And if some friends come along for the ride, so much the better.