Fun With Words, Frost Warning, A Day Outside

Up at 5 AM. Breakfasted and caffeinated, with an hour to kill before I leave for the day.

 Fun With Words From Merriam-Webster

10 Words for Food with Unfortunate Names - I'm not seeing haggis, but oh yeah for spotted dick. Why not toad in a hole?

Noah Webster's Spelling Wins and Fails

News

Indiana GOP lawmakers propose major change for DCS at 11th hour with no public input - this sounds a little dumb, if you have had any experience with the DCS system. the prosecutor/cop analogy is weakened when we look at the number of prosecutors who are now full-time, rising out of arguments the old part-time prosecutors were not effective in fighting crime. About the children in system - is this high for our population; if so, why?

Gun found in student's possession at Central High School - what does a 16 year old Muncie kid need with a pistol, why does he take it to school?

Writing stuff

Here is a spooky flash fiction that jump-started my heart this morning: Till I Die Again by Jeffrey Baiden.

Authors Publish has 45 Writers’ “Rules for Writing”. I am working on the writers I have read.

Elmore Leonard, I think I have seen this before but not the full passage that follows:

“I always refer to style as sound,” says Leonard. “The sound of the writing.” Some of Leonard’s suggestions appeared in a 2001 New York Times article that became the basis of his 2007 book, Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing. Here are those rules in outline form:

1. Never open a book with the weather.
2. Avoid prologues.
3. Never use a verb other than “said” to carry dialogue.
4. Never use an adverb to modify the verb “said.”
5. Keep your exclamation points under control!
6. Never use the words “suddenly” or “all hell broke loose.”
7. Use regional dialect, patois,  sparingly.
8. Avoid detailed descriptions of characters.
9. Same for places and things.
10. Leave out the parts readers tend to skip.

I have seen George Orwell’s Tips For Effective Writing.

I do not recall seeing Nietzsche’s 10 Rules for Writers, Penned in a Letter to His Lover and Muse, but I like 1, 3, and 4 - even if I do not attain them myself.

 I have read only one of his books (American Gods), still I think highly of Neil Gaiman, now his Put One Word After Another: Neil Gaiman’s Eight Rules of Writing makes him even more impressive. I can do these things.

Jack Kerouac’s 30 Tips are a bit harder to read, but I am passing it along. Like the others, there are good things here, except for the abbreviations needing decoded.

More of this later. Need to shower, dress, and head to the sheriff's. Counselor at 10 am.

sch 7:01