I, your resident dancing monkey, suddenly feel the need to randomly post about things grammar- and composition-related. Yes, like thousands of people before me, I shall bore you with things that you forgot promptly after seventh grade. This I promise. I shall also, if all goes well, try to bore you in such a way that we’re not all caught up in clauses and phrases and participles. (For heaven’s sake, don’t let your participles dangle! You’ll put someone’s eye out!) Who really needs technical terms, anyway? Isn’t the very act of fully constructing well-read sentences and paragraphs enough? (This is only true, of course, unless you’re one of those editors who are sticklers for parts of speech and technical jargon, in which case I highly suggest that you look elsewhere for style guidelines and technical rules…)
Now, how about a little of me before we begin? You can, of course, go to the “About Me” (or whatever it’s called…I forget now) section of this web site and learn more than you ever wanted to know about me, but that seems a little in-depth for the purposes of my blog. Here’s the long and short of it: I got a BA in English from the University of Indianapolis in 2001, after taking several technical proofreading and editing courses. (If you happen to be at U of I and are remotely interested, the editing courses there are [were] top notch! Dr. Noble is a brilliant, brilliant man.) I went on to achieve a Master of Arts in Teaching Secondary English/Language Arts at the University of Indianapolis in 2003 while proofreading for a small press. I spent about a year teaching middle-school students the basics when it comes to American English grammar and literature, but missed my proofreading and editing. I needed books to work on. Thus, while performing odd jobs to help supplement my income, my freelance editing career began. I have been a freelance editor for 7 or so years now, which makes me by no means an expert on the English language. For those who would like to send me gifts of adoration, my favorite color is pink and I knit.
There you have it. Those are my (maybe-not-so-impressive) credentials. And I’m really bad at blogging consistently. Really bad. Be warned.