What: Editors BC professional development seminar
When: Four Saturdays, April 24, May 1, 8, and 15, 2021, 10:30 am to 12:00 pm
Where: All sessions online through Zoom
Cost: $140 for Editors Canada members ($110 early bird), $195 for non-members ($165 early bird), and $70 for student affiliates. Advance registration required. Registration closes April 21, 2021, at 11:59 pm; early-bird rates are in effect through April 3, 2021.
Want to flex your grammar (and punctuation and usage) muscles?
Cheryl Hannah noticed this sign while waiting to be seated at a Vancouver Island restaurant. She was puzzled why the copywriter chose to insert a full stop after “We will be Pleased to seat you” but omitted one after “Welcome.” She was also puzzled why the copywriter chose to capitalize “Pleased.”
Family members, accustomed to her editorial obsessions, formed a ring around her so that she could take the photo without causing a scene.
Photo by Cheryl Hannah.
Imagine. You’ve been captured by a plunder of punctuation-hating pirates and forced to walk the plank. As you teeter, The Oxford Guide to Writing and The Chicago Manual of Style clutched to your breast, the pirate king speaks. “The semicolon has no place in online writing!” he says. “Renounce your admiration for it and live!”
What do you do?
Take the West Coast Editor poll and tell us. Are semicolons essential aids to understanding—even in online writing—fulfilling a role distinct from that of the full stop? Or are they mere affectations, relics from our print-bound past?
Maureen Phillips spotted this sign for “Mike’s Tailor” (His own tailor? Lucky Mike!) and “professional altetration” services (whoops) while driving along Broadway Street in Vancouver. She didn’t have the heart to go in and point out the mistakes, though. Photo by Maureen Phillips.
In honour of National Punctuation Day, we present “The Apostrophe Song,” a song that aims to “put the apostrophe back in its place.” It’s a four-minute tuneful celebration of the greengrocer’s apostrophe—Drive-by editing set to music, if you will…
The song was created for Cool Rules, an Australian writing-skills training firm.
Words and music by Shaun McNicholas. Vocals by Gypsy Lehmann.
While editing may be the first step to fame and fortune, terminal punctuation (on this sign from the shop floor of Macy’s Seattle) is not. Photo by David Harrison.
This sign could benefit from a liberal dose of full stops (“No appointment necessary drop in or call”) and spell-checking (“Work to-day get paid to-day”). Photo by Frank Karabotsos.
West Coast Editor 