Are you’s, Ewes?

You’s comin’ up for tea? There are a few phrases and words that drive me mad. In fact, they do more than get on my nerves. It’s like ‘hearing’ rage. I hear it and I want to punch someone, generally the culprit because it would be unfair to hit anyone else. I’m sure I would get away with justifiable homicide if I worked someone over enough about it. But using 'you's' or 'youse' is referring to female sheep to me (different spelling of course), and I'm no Dolly. 

I get that there are so many ways to say something; Australia in particular is full of slang and short cuts, it makes us Aussies. Some of it is historical, some is hysterical and some is horrific. We Australians all know what it means when someone says, ‘what’s your ankle biter having for its tucker? Tell him to bog in and stop his yabbering’.  We would probably not say it anymore or because many of us feel that’s best left with the cockys, bushys and some old timers but stuff like ‘yous’ instead of ‘you all’ and when someone says, ‘I seen that myself’ rather than ‘I saw’ or ‘I done that yesterday’ as an alternative of ‘I did’, is simply off beam. There’s no room for it, none.  It’s inexcusable. 

I understand nowadays that there are fairly strict societal rules about being politically correct and thank God. I know that sometimes people just don’t know what the hell to say particularly because governments upgrade language to acceptable standards so that minority groups in particular are not discriminated against, offended or that the speaker doesn’t come across sounding like a red necked imbecile. But this is incredibly misguided.  You see seen is a past participle so use it by all means, but when using it put stuff before it like ‘I have seen it’, this is an auxiliary verb and you can use have, had, was, were, am, is and so on or use saw…it’s not hard, it just isn’t. It’s past, present and future. The difference is akin with done and did. People will want to physically harm you if you say ‘I done it like that’, instead of ‘I did it like that’. Work out if it’s past or present. People will love you for it. http://www.kirstieanders.com/

Ask me

Not Noah’s boat that housed millions of coupled animals, no. This is a language disaster. Try though I may I just can’t get past it. When someone says to me ‘Arks your friend if I can borrow her pen’ or ‘I'm arksking you to come over here', I could die...well almost. I will never, ever be ready for 'arks'...unless of course it’s God sending a message about it raining for 40 days and 40 nights to drown us right out.
Ark ɑːk/ noun 1. (in the Bible) the ship built by Noah to save his family and two of every kind of animal from the flood; Noah's ark. o archaic a ship or boat. plural noun: arks

People!!!! - get it right. It’s ASK. Arse-K. Always has been (well since the 1600’s), always will be. ‘Ask me a question’, or ‘Ask me what my favourite colour is’...I don't care, just don't arks me...it’s wrong, it's frigging lazy and it's a boat built cubit by cubit. My thoughts are, if it’s cultural, that’s okay. If it’s a speech impediment, that's okay...if not...don’t use it. It discredit’s you. Most of you are not gangsters, rappers or from the Caribbean. Back in Chaucer’s day he used ‘I ax’...Chaucer wrote between 1374 to 1386. The olden days. Even Shakespeare used ‘Ask’. Stop it...it’s ARRRSSSKKKK...Ask. It’s just ask.

Why is a real person best?

People! Don’t trust your spell check only. Well not to capture more than misspelled words anyway and sometimes it finds it hard to distinguish between US spelling and Australian spelling so may still get it wrong.

Don’t rely on tools for digital accuracy either; they may pick up spelling but not always grammar mistakes and if they do pick up some grammatical errors they sometimes replace them with incorrect suggestions. You just can’t beat the eye of a human proofreader. Digital will cost you in more ways than one and will get you 50% but not 100%. A real proofreader/editor will cost you too but you can often negotiate and your work will be dead right.

There are a number of online programs you c

an use such as Ginger, Whitesmoke, Text to speed, After the deadline, Microsoft word, Online correction, Grammar check, Reverso, Spellcheck plus, Paper rater, turnitin…just to name a few and then there’s me. Try them yourself. On their landing page they give you an opportunity to trial a passage. I tried with all of the above and not once did it pick up all the errors. Truthfully they often managed 80% of the spelling errors, sometimes more but missed the grammatical errors nearly 100% of the time. I looked into these programs to be a backup for my editing and proofreading work but was disappointed with the results. Certainly for spelling but then just go with Microsoft word which is free and more accurate than the other programs I trialled. If you're keen to get it right first time check out my website and contact me for a quote via my website www.kirstieanders.com

Tautologies and Feedback

When writing a paper, using a trillion purposeless words are a waste of time. They’re unnecessarily filling. It’s like pouring custard on a custard tart. Why would you do it? It is an obvious striving to reach that word count that looms ahead of you and you have run out of references or things to say. Thing is, your lecturer knows this.  You’re probably better off being under the word count than adding verbose jargon.  Reading papers like this as an editor and proofreader is like listening to a wordy little tune by Paul Simon about a bat faced girl.  No-one really enjoys that. My red pen comes out and slashes at these words with teeth bared and great resolve and gladness.  Superfluous words like tautologies of; in  addition or worse - in addition to that, furthermore, also, still, moreover, henceforth (personal disgust), hereafter, nonetheless, nevertheless. Then there is the over use of ‘the’ and ‘so’.  You don’t need to use ‘the’ all the time. ‘The best practice’ for example is okay, in fact superior being called ‘best practice’.  I can often see thesaurus suggestions jump out at me in paragraphs that have required paraphrasing. Phrases like ‘a large proportion’ instead of the word, ‘many’. ‘By virtue of the fact that’, actually just ‘because’ would do. What about ‘sum total’ isn’t that the same thing? Or ‘unexpected surprise?’  However, (there just did it myself, but sometimes it is necessary, you can’t always just leap into a room without knocking first) reading page after page where an author has consistently and persistently used the same phrase at every paragraph without pause, like ‘in addition’ rather than mixing it up just a bit really does my head in. 

It’s funny, or maybe not that funny, that authors have asked me after proofreading and/or editing many works, what I thought of the paper as a whole. I do understand this but find it immaterial too. My role is to correct it, make it better, they want the feedback. I feel that it’s a bit like when a defendant asks his/her lawyer, ‘do you think I'm innocent?’ and the lawyer says, ‘it’s not what I think, it’s what I can prove’. It doesn't matter what I think, it’s what I can do to make it the best it can be. But I understand that feedback is important and I'm the one reading their work so it makes sense. What I have noticed is that when I give feedback, the client develops more of a trust with me and I feel more supportive. It alters our relationship just that little bit and in a positive way because I have gone from just some entity making red and blue marks on their papers to someone who has some feeling and opinion about what they have written. I think they deserve feedback and make a point now to give some encouraging comments as well as suggestions of what they might need to change to make it great. Proofreader and editor? http://kirstieanders16.wix.com/editingproofreading