Happy National Grammar Day!

It's National Grammar Day--which is like Christmas to those of us who think about words for a living. Okay, not really. But all of us in the editorial department get a special little thrill out of all things grammar- and punctuation-related.

I asked a few of my colleagues to share what they love about grammar or punctuation...

Michael: I probably have 10 grammar guides at home; I used to read the dictionary for fun in 4th and 5th grade (loving the punctuation guide and discovering something called the subjunctive!! "If he were going home this afternoon, . . ."); and I had an uncle who said he had a semi-colon because of his appendectomy.

Julie: I love the exclamation point! The rules say to limit their usage, but it is hard for me to do so. In my perfect world, everything would be said with excitement and enthusiasm.

Christianne: I love the period. It’s so final and so basic. However, I can make a pretty good case for the comma. It offers a nice pause, but nothing overly dramatic. It’s an understated mark that people often overuse and underuse. But when used correctly, it gives the nicest little break in any sentence.

Ali: Probably commas in compound sentences. Which is super nerdy. Or hyphens between compound adjectives. On another note, things that are incorrectly hyphenated are my biggest pet peeve.

And mine? Well, I harbor a not-so-secret love for the look of a diagrammed sentence (I never learned to diagram sentences in school, so my adoration of them wasn't spoiled); I was a two-time winner of the Onamia Elementary spelling bee (the trophy pictured here is my participant trophy from the regional bee, during which I didn't make it to the second round); I married a guy who used to copyedit for a living; and my favorite punctuation mark is, of course, the semicolon.

What about you?

"This annoys me," she frowned.

Someone linked to this Onion story today on Twitter, and while I thought it was funny, it also brought up one of my biggest writing pet peeves—misusing verbs of utterance.
Now, I know English is a rapidly changing thing, the rules are fluid, etc. But can I tell you the quickest way to make me roll my eyes and make me get out my red pen is to write something like this:

“I agree,” he nodded.

Oh. It makes me cringe just to type it! People. You can’t nod a sentence. You say it. You yell it. You cry it, maybe, or even whimper it. And you can nod at the same time. But you can’t nod speech. You can’t shrug it, or smile it, or frown it. You can speak and move at the same time, of course, but then it’s a different sentence:

“I agree.” He nodded.

Or

“I agree,” he said, nodding.

Or

He nodded. "I agree," he said.

I realize this is largely a nitpicky grammar thing, but to me, it smacks of something careless—not paying attention to how people move? Not knowing the limits of what certain verbs can do? When I read the first sentence, the "nodded" stops me. I can't see or hear it anymore, which is the opposite of its intention. And if you're the offending writer, you can't tell me it's in the service of the writing.

I also realize that many a famous author does this, but it drives me nuts, and I edit it out of books with wild abandon. Do other people have annoyances like this when they’re reading? Or is it mostly limited to those of us who are paid to wield our red pens?

Gosh, this post makes me sound crabby! Really, I'm not the kind of person who goes around correcting the improper use of the subjunctive, or anything like that. Some things just really get me going.

Thanks for letting me vent!
More soon--
Beth