Crystal Clear Proofing

Monday, November 30, 2009

Spelling Challenge

Hey! What's the Spelling Challenge doing here on Monday? I decided to test your spelling skills at the beginning of the week rather than at the end! So let's get those brain cells all fired up and see how you do! Get your sticky note and pen, and write down the correct spelling for the ten words below.

NO PEEKING!

(Still loving this little peeking furry!)

1. falascious
2. drunkeness
3. subpeona
4. peurile
5. irrascible
6. deterance
7. viscious
8. afficianado
9. rhythym
10. tarrif

If you spell all ten words correctly, you get the beautiful sparkling gold glitter star! Good Luck!

Whether or not you get your star, everyone gets this spray of PURPLE glitter stars for your efforts! It just wouldn't be right not to have purple stars as part of the Spelling Challenge, now would it?

ANSWERS:

1. fallacious
2. drunkenness
3. subpoena
4. puerile
5. irascible
6. deterrence
7. vicious
8. aficionado
9. rhythm
10. tariff

Keep a smile on your face, spread some HAPPY, and

Sunday, November 22, 2009

Happy Thanksgiving!

"I awoke this morning with devout thanksgiving for my friends, the old and the new."

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~

There will be no posts this week on CCP. I will be having a rather busy week in preparation of the holiday, and with all details yet to be worked out, things are rather unpredictable at this point.

I'm hoping to be able to take a moment here and there to peek in on things!

~ Treasure the time with family and friends ~
Enjoy and celebrate the festivities of Thanksgiving!

Blessings to you all!
~ Crystal ~

Friday, November 20, 2009

Spelling Challenge

It's Fun Friday's Spelling Challenge! Also, at the very end of this post is yesterdays Thorough Thursday Challenge, with the misspelled words highlighted in red.

Okay! Write down the correct spelling for today's words, and as usual the answers are listed below.

NO PEEKING!

(I just love this little peeking furry!)

1. temprament
2. boundry
3. seargant
4. acheivement
5. promissary
6. disasterous
7. surreptitous
8. absense
9. superintendant
10. exorbitant

BONUS WORD
sacriligeous

Time to see which if you get to add to that collection of virtual stars!
Spelling all 10 words correctly
gets you get a sparkling GOLD star!

Spell the bonus word correctly,
and you get the prized, very special, much coveted and very beautiful
Crystal Clear Proofing PURPLE star! It's a great star, isn't it?

Spell all 10 AND the bonus word correctly
will get a GOLD AND a PURPLE star!
(I know, the excitement is overwhelming!)

ANSWERS:

1. temperament
2. boundary
3. sergeant
4. achievement
5. promissory
6. disastrous
7. surreptitious
8. absence
9. superintendent
10. exorbitant

BONUS WORD:
sacrilegious

Yup, I did slip one in on you this week. "Exorbitant" was spelled correctly. Did I stump you? At least cause you to wonder about it?

So how many more stars did you get to add to your ever-growing collection this week? In place of having your name in lights, I had to keep with the whole star theme, and offer everyone a fun fireworks star! Tah-Dah!

Now, here is yesterday's Thorough Thursday post in its entirety, with the errors corrected and highlighted in red.

*******************************************************************************
Original weblogs had to be manually updated through multiple sections of a common website. The creation of the majority of tools that allow authoring and maintenance of articles posted in a reverse chronological order, initiated a much easier publishing process, for a less technical, expansive population. The result was the forming of a direct class for what is known as online publishing, which has given us the blogs we see today. Obtaining blog software like WordPress, Blogger and LiveJournal are available through a number of web hosting services. This provides blinding speed and instant reaction to any concern or topic on the "global podium."

Since 2002 blogs have gained notoriety and credibility for their part in breaking, shaping and spinning news stories. It has become a way of throwing important information into the public limelight. It now, for all intent and purposes, drives mainstream media by forcing them to follow their lead. Blogging has become a priceless tool for quality communication and a way for intelligent people to provide intelligent and valuable insight, opinions and information.

In 1999 new software services like Blogger and LiveJournal were launched, making blogs much simpler to create.

Today, more than one blog is created every second and there are currently over 100,000 million blogs worldwide.

*******************************************************************************
Every one of you deserves recognition, and that's why we must continue the tradition of spreading the now famous Crystal Clear Proofing HAPPY! This week you all get to put a smile on your face with this happy DANCING STAR!

Remember to live each moment, count your lucky stars, feel some HAPPY, and then spread it around!

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Thoroughness Challenge

Thoroughly Thursday is a weekly post consisting of paragraphs that contain spelling and/or grammatical errors, and your job is to find them. Please do not list the errors you find within the post. The same post is repeated at the end of Fun Friday's Spelling Challenge, with the errors corrected and highlighted in red.

Note: Names and places will NOT be misspelled, nor will there by any changes to punctuation. In addition, if there is a word that may have more than one accepted form or there is more than one accepted spelling, those also will not be changed. That would not be fair...the purpose of the Challenge is thoroughness, not technicalities.

This week your Challenge paragraphs continue with the history of blogs and blogging as they evolve and begin to immerge as the blogs we're familiar with today. This week you're looking for 11 errors. Good Luck!

*******************************************************************************

Original weblogs had to be manually updated threw multiple sections of a common website. The creation of the majority of tools that allow authoring and maintainance of articals posted in a reverse chronilogical order, initiated a much easier publishing process, for a less technical, expansive population. The result was the forming of a direct class for what is known as online publishing, which has given us the blogs we see today. Obtaining blog software like WordPress, Blogger and LiveJournal are availible through a number of web hosting services. This provides blinding speed and instant reaction to any concern or topic on the "global podium."

Since 2002 blogs have gained notoriaty and credability for there part in braking, shaping and spinning news stories. It has become a way of throwing important infomation into the public limelight. It now, for all intents and purposes, drives mainstream media by forcing them to follow there lead. Blogging has become a priceless tool for quality communication and a way for intelligent people to provide intelligent and valuable insight, opinions and information.

In 1999 new software services like Blogger and LiveJournal were launched, making blogs much simpler to create.

Today, more than one blog is created every second and there are currently over 100,000 million blogs worldwide.

*******************************************************************************

Be sure to check back tomorrow to see how thorough you are!

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Wednesday's Weird Word

Wednesday's Word is a weekly feature which gives you the opportunity to grow your vocabulary with a not-very-common and/or not-frequently-used word.

Today's word is: SCUNNER, and its pronounciation is: skun-er.

Scunner is noun, meaning a strong dislike; an aversion.

Personally, I have a definite scunner of spiders.

As a matter of fact, I was going to include a picture of a spider in this post, and I couldn't do it! I didn't want to "see" that all day! *shudder*

So, is there anything or anyone that you take a scunner to?

See you back next Wednesday for another new, weird word!

Reader Comments

This is one of the reasons I love your blog. I find things here that no other blog has! Between cool words and your fun challenges, not to mention your awesome tutorials you have a wonderfully unique and helpful blog!

You make lessons lots of fun. A wonderful gift!

Bravo! Your blog is inventive, informative and FUN! You have a real knack for presenting what could be HO-HUM in a fascinating way!

You truly do have one of my favorite blogs. Those spelling posts are working wonders for me. Thanks again!

Your blog is tremendously helpful...thank you very much for the great blogging you do! You provide a wonderful service for us writers.

Love your blog posts - you have such a succinct and clear way of clearing up the most difficult and subtle nuances of good writing and editing.

You have a special talent for clarifying literary distinctions.

You realy do need to write a grammar book! No one does these posts better and makes them as easy to understand & remember as you do!

Great and informative post. It's so nice and succinct - grammar seems soooo much easier now.

I am so delighted to have found you! I look forward to following your blog.

As usual, your in-depth posts bring clear distinction to often gray and fuzzy topics.

you really do do this extremely well.

Great tips. You always have such useful information. Thanks.

I think your blog is great! Very helpful

All good information...I love your tutorials!

Some excellent advice and as usual, very clearly explained. Thanks for the help.

Love your blog...Thanks for this, you're keeping English intact.

Thanks. I love your site for the great information.

Once again, a clear (crystal), concise, and easy to understand tutorial, my dear. And once again, I got it bookmarked. I'm putting together an editing/proofreading e-book for my personal use with the compilation of all these wonderful posts - thanks!

Your post are helping to alleviate the grammar phobia in me. Thanks, Crystal.

Crystal Clear Proofing posts the greatest writing/editing tutorials. As an editor myself, I go there often to learn subtle nuances in the craft of good writing, as she has this marvelous ability to make those fuzzy, sometimes hard to determine, gray areas of correct writing, well…Crystal Clear!

I do love your posts, they have such great information.

You always break it down into realistic terms, Crystal!

You have such interesting posts. Thanks.

Crystal, I think I'm going to print out all your posts and staple them together for my own style book. Thanks!

Thanks for the great posts!

I have learned much from your blog.

Just excellent. I need to remember all these things. All the time. Thanks.

Thanks for these tips; they're very useful! Readers get drawn into stories in part because of good, clean writing, and these are valuable ideas for creating that kind of writing.

I.E AND E.G.
Thank you! I've never know what those meant or how to properly use them!

JOINT AND SEPARATE POSSESSION
Thank you so much! I had a hard time finding what joint and seperate possession means! Once again, thank you!

WAIT AND AWAIT
Oh, I love this site! Do you have a past post about lay, lie and all that good stuff?

This is a very clear and succinct explanation of the distinction between the two words."

LAY AND LIE
OMG! This is GREAT!!! I might actually understand it now! Thanks so much, Crystal. This is an awesome site!

You have a great way of explaining words. Your blog is a wonderful source for writers. I'll have to search your post to see if you have "affect" "effect", I know I use those improperly often.

AFFECT AND EFFECT
Thank you for this great post! I have printed it to keep it handy. Hopefully, it will positively affect my future writing.

Thanks for this post Crystal. I was going to actually email you and request that you explain the difference between these two, because these are usually a problem for me. Thanks again!

Another classic, Crystal Clear explanation...this tutorial contains some subtle nuances well worth being reminded of. Thanks!

THAT AND WHICH
Another excellent grammar lesson!

You are really rockin' this grammar instruction! I am currently working on a short story for class, which must be submitted this week, and this was very helpful. Did I get it right? (Note from CCP: she did get it right!)

WHO AND WHOM
Perfect! Got it...I keep all these tutorials in a bookmarked file now.

Great tutorial!! I'm saving this one.

Another great tutorial.

QUOTATION MARKS
Great post. Good tips about punctuation.

AWHILE AND A WHILE
Another fine tutorial. Got it added to my Clear as a Crystal file.

What a wonderful tip!

Oh!!! Those examples are perfect and it really makes sense now. Thanks!

APOSTROPHE USE WITH POSSESSIVE NOUNS
Excellent and very thorough. Got this one copied and stored along with ALL your tutorials in my Crystal Clear Writing folder. :)

Another excellent post. I always have trouble with these.

Now that my eyes have re-focused after glazing over, I can say that this is why writers need to hire editors--So they don't have to think too much about grammar. I can't keep all the darn rules straight in my head. Thanks for doing what you do. I am cutting and pasting this into a new word file for grammar tips.

Good one! I'm tweeting this.

Clear and concise. Thanks.

That possessive S has at some points been the bane of my existence...so thanks for this.

Great article! Thanks for the examples too.

Confusing topic, excellent post. Many people really do not know at all how to handle these pesky little things, so thanks for 'splaining it so nicely.

Excellent post! I enjoyed this a lot...Great blog. :)

LEVELS OF EDITING
Crystal, great explanation and post today - I copied it as a word doc and stored it in my "Crystal Clear" file.

You've written a wonderful post that throws light on a rather mysterious (to me) subject.

ONE WORD VS. TWO WORDS
Another great post.

Thanks for sharing this list and clarifying these points.

WRITING DATES AND TIMES
Writing dates and times is always confusing for me, so I really appreciate this, Crystal! Thanks.

Great tips. This is very helpful. Thanks.

Awesome tips. I make some of those mistakes.

I will copy and paste into a writing tips folder I've started to gather all these handy dandy things in one place. Thank you.

Great post!

What a very useful post! I'm going to bookmark it for easy reference. Thanks Crystal!

Good stuff Crystal!

Very good and clear lesson here. Copied and pasted it into a Word Doc and saved it in my "Crystal Clear" file!

You have some good reference article(s) here, Crystal. :-)

PREPOSITIONS
Excellent tutorial, got it saved as usual.

Thanks for this! Bookmarking it for easy reference.

SEMICOLONS
Another great and much needed post for people like me. This is why you are the Grammar Goddess!

Oh I agree. You are the Grammar Goddess. I have the worst time with commas and semicolons. Thanks for the helpful post. I'll have to print this out and keep it close.

I bow to you, Grammar Goddess. Another one to save in my growing list from your posts.

Oh great Grammar Goddess, how I worship you! Thanks so much for this post.

You make it look so easy!

Good one!

Oh my goodness you have made it so clear! I'm sure it will be this clear when I am writing later...Thank you!

COLONS
As always, awesome advice and clarification.

Thanks, Crystal. Helpful, as always.

Great advice, Crystal! I'm tweeting.

Helpful as always. Thanks.

DASHES
You should really turn your blog into a book. Now THAT is a grammar book I would buy!

Thank you so much for this post. The explanations and examples made it "crystal clear" for me. :-)

I like your distinction between the use of dash and colon. It makes sense to me.

Most helpful. I just had to change a host of en dashes to em dashes in my ms.

HYPHENS
Thank you very much for this post!

Great tips, Crystal! Thanks so much.

Such great advice! Thanks for the valuable lesson!!

Great post. Thanks.

Wow! Thank you for taking the time to clear up some of the confusion about hyphens. As always, a very helpful post.

These are wonderful guidelines, Crystal, thank you!

Another fine tutorial.

I'm pretty sure I don't use hyphens correctly. It was good to read through this advice and think about how I do use them. Thanks.

Good post, great blog!

OVER THE TOP AWARD
Congratulations, you and your blog are "Over the Top."

Your blog is sure Over the Top! One of my favorites!

FIFTEEN PUNCTUATION FACTS YOU NEED TO KNOW
Great summary.

Love this post!! I needed this one. I think I might have to frame it and stick it beside my desk as a reminder when I'm writing! You rock!!

Great tips! I'm tweeting.

Crystal this is excellent. I've got it stored in my Crystal Clear file folder.

Yeah, I've created a Crystal folder as well and cut and paste all your gems.

Thanks for these tips, Crystal! Very useful! I think I should post them above my desk!

Another very useful post, Crystal.

Great tips as always :)

You always make this painless. Thanks Crystal.

EFFECTIVE WRITING
I think this is one of my favorite rules post yet. So helpful!! May have to post this one on my desk too, I know I'll get one of those flip book easels so I can have all your post handy and in my face to remind me. I need that, you are an editor extraodinaire!!!

Thanks for making grammar crystal clear once again, Crystal.

Another fine lesson, Crystal on some of the finer points of good prose. Got this one saved, too.

I love the examples - they make it so much easier to remember these rules!

And another of your posts goes into the 'keep' file. Bless you, my dear, for making it all so Crystal Clear!

Oh, man, I wish I could send this to all the writers I worked with and trained over the years at TV stations! You rock, Crystal!

CLAUSES
Thanks! I love these tutorials.

Very helpful and easy to understand as always!

CHALLENGES
Great idea for a proofreader post!

Your posts are fun, creative, and challenge our brains.

What a fun exercise!

This is a great exercise, Crystal! I really appreciate your blog.

I just love your challenges - they make me realize how much I still have to learn!

This is great, I like the new Challenge! Great blog too, glad to have found you on blogger!

I love these!

Thanks Crystal. :) This is fun.

This is a great exercise for concentration; thanks!

Another excellent week of challenges...Keep them coming!

These are so much fun, Crystal. Helps keep us sharp, too!

This is an interesting weekly challenge, Crystal; it shows me time and time again how easy it is for my brain to skip over mistakes.

I love the idea of doing this weekly. What a fun little challenge.

This is such fun to do...Thanks for providing a means for waking up my brain.

This is great...Thanks, Crystal! So fun!

I LOVE the spelling challenge!! I am a horrible speller and need all the help I can get. Great idea for a weekly post.

It's so easy, isn't it, to miss those little things that, in the end, make writing look polished or look "raw." This is a good exercise : ). I look forward to more.

Yippee for me. Got them this time. So fun, Crystal. Thanks.

As always, you're the Grammar Goddess. Thanks for keeping us on our toes.

Thanks, as always, for these little challenges. It's so important to communicate clearly when one writes, and readers do *not* want to be bothered by obvious spelling goofs.

Love the spelling challenges.

Wow, you really know how to get a brain working! Thanks again for another helpful post!

Thanks for this challenge. I appreciate the exercise. It's always good to keep in practice.

I just love your challenges - they make me realize how much I still have to learn!

Great test! Thanks, I love your posts!

***************************************************************************************** "Editors and proof readers are the unrecognized support structure of books. Without them, books would take authors twice as long to complete." Comment left by Leigh Russell (CRIME FICTION)