Saturday, September 15, 2007

Bad Writing Habit

8 'Izzat 164 B.E. - Saturday, September 15, 2007 about 12:20 PM PDT

I've noticed a bad writing habit lately. This is something I've always did, but it hasn't been an irritant until now. I backspace when I want the change a word, it's a bad habit and time consuming. It's unnecessary, even when I type a blog entry directly into the blog it's unnecessary. This blog and every blog I post to has a spell checker, which will catch most of the misspellings.

All right there are some problems that a spell checker won't catch. Some bad habits, such as using the passive voice need a grammar checker to catch. Wordiness in a sentence also needs a grammar checker. Sentence fragments sometimes needs a grammar checker, especially if you don't reread your post before publishing it, but those are problems that one can't worry about. The biggest problem, from my point of view and at this time in my life is misspelled words.

Even with a spell checker there are just some words that give you problems. Spell checkers aren't perfect they miss words. Grammar checkers aren't perfect either. The best thing for a writer to do is proof read and save the blog entry as a draft. The writer can print the draft out and read it over before actually posting it. Of course this takes time and perhaps it's too much to ask for or expect in a blog posting. I really don't know about that, I haven't even considered it before now and I'll have to think about it.

Right now my biggest problem is keeping myself from backspacing when I'm writing. For warm up writing exercises it's not important. Writing exercises are to get the muse involved in the process of creation. Writing exercises are to get the fingers moving and the brain engaged. They are necessary for daily writing, especially for writer's who want to eventually be published. That's one reason writing exercises are good posts in blogs, the get the brain engaged and the fingers moving. They also show where a writer needs improvement.

Does the writer have a problem with the passive voice or with wordiness? If so then the writer can copy and post the blog entry into a word processing file and find where she can improve. Does the writer have a problem with spelling? If the writer spells the word the way it sounds, then most spell checkers (I've found) can find a list of all the possible words. The problem with backspacing during a writing exercise is one the writer has to deal with and overcome on a daily basis. Blog posting help overcome that problem.
  • Disclosure Policy for Poet 999's Thoughts about Writing and Other Stuff
  • 0 Comments

  • 0 Comments:

    Post a Comment

    Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]

    << Home

    ss_blog_claim=a8c1097db65820f0a340f0696e6013a9 ss_blog_claim=a8c1097db65820f0a340f0696e6013a9