Could we all please agree that we are waiting for the virus vaccine, not waiting on the vaccine? We wait for a train (while waiting “on” the platform). I think I would need to be a gymnast to wait on the train (especially while it’s moving . . . ). We wait for our friends…

While we are on the discussion of upper and lower case letters and upper and lower case . . . wait! Is it numbers or numerals? I confess that I use the word “number” for everything, but after researching, I learned that I should choose the word “numeral” for most of my uses. Last week’s…

Last week, I talked about upper and lower case letters. This week, let’s consider an outline. We use upper case letters in an outline [A, B, C, etc.]. These letters are then generally followed by a period. For more detailed outlines, we add lower case letters [a, b, c, etc.]. I’ve seen these smaller letters…

The use of “upper case” and “lower case” when describing capital letters or “small” letters comes from the early printing days. Each letter was made into a block. The block letters were placed by hand in a row to make words that would be inked and then paper would be placed on top of the…

I just read that the “ick” sound at the end of a word is spelled “ick” when that word has only one syllable, as is sick. When the word has more than one syllable, that same sound is spelled “ic,” as in psychic. Why this language has to be so confusing, I will never know…

Speaking of homonyms, check out this Note on a survey: “Steal Guardrail Overhead.” HAHA! Should I follow these instructions?

All of this talk about a pandemic made me want to know more about its definition. “Demic” (or deme or demos from Greek) is often defined as a district. When you add the prefix “epi,” we find definitions that refer to a disease affecting many people but, again, on a somewhat localized basis, affecting a…

Many of my adult literacy and GED students ask me when to use certain words. Some of them are native foreign language speakers; some are just puzzled about when to use a particular synonym. I’ll give you several examples over the next few months and YOU can help me come up with reasons why one…

A street? What about an avenue, or a boulevard – a court, a drive, a lane, or a trail? Who decides what kind of “road” it is? As it turns out, there are rules that are (mostly) followed. I asked my transportation expert friend, Frank Consoli, for advice. Here is his response. “A ‘road’ is…

I’m working on a Communications book and one of the sections illustrates the importance of an audience’s “frame of reference.” With that thought in mind, I had to laugh at my recent experience as the audience. I saw a local newspaper headline that mentioned the date for parks to reopen was uncertain. Aw, heck! I…