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National Punctuation Day
- Thread starter Doctor Q
- Start date
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Sticklers unite, this is one of those days for people who read Eats Shoots and Leaves
I bet there is a bunch of people here who will be celebrating this day.
I bet there is a bunch of people here who will be celebrating this day.
I can t believe that I missed the celebration Oh well I am not that big a fan of punctuation anyway 
We need more days like that. I think we should have an on-going contest on the forums for the person with the best overall grammar.
The mall named Beverly Center (not far from "The Grove" Apple Store in Los Angeles) has a wooden sculpture that I've always liked. It's a stack of punctuation marks!
I found this photo at http://www.geocities.co.jp/SilkRoad-Desert/7577/DIARY0312.html:
![beverly_center.JPG]()
I found this photo at http://www.geocities.co.jp/SilkRoad-Desert/7577/DIARY0312.html:
You are right. That would make more sense. The date of August 22 was picked because it is the birthday of the originator of the holiday, Jeff Rubin, owner/publisher of the "Put it in Writing" newsletter publishing company.wdlove said:
They should make punctuation day a vacation day. A day to get away from punctuation in English class, just like Labor day is a day to get away from work.
T
thejazzman10
Guest
I LOVA PUNTUATION!!1!111! WTF LOL I DO SO GOD AT IT1111!!!! WTF LOL IM DA BST AT GRMM3R!!11!11 LOL
Post made with AOLer Translator
Post made with AOLer Translator
Obviously, nobody can understand this foreign language, so I translated it from AOL to English for the rest of you. Here's what Apple Hobo said:Apple Hobo said:
And in case you don't know the difference between a dash and a hyphen, it's easy to tell them apart. The dash is the unshifted symbol on the key to the right of the zero key on the American keyboard. The hyphen, on the other hand, is the unshifted symbol on the key to the left of the equal sign on the American keyboard.
I'm glad I could clear all that up for you!
Really, the hyphen is different from the dash. An en dash is the length of the letter "n", and is used to join two parts of a word broken by a line break. An em dash is the length of the letter "m", and is used for denoting parenthetical statements and for ranges of values (i.e. "sixteen to twenty" becomes 1620). It is often typed as a pair of hyphens together. A hyphen is used to create compound words.
Em dash: option-shift-hyphen
En dash: option-hyphen
-Hyphen
Em dash: option-shift-hyphen
En dash: option-hyphen
-Hyphen
You are right of course, Daveman, but didn't you see all my smilies?
As long as you brought it up, however, it is an interesting subject. The en dash and em dash came from typesetting, and were around long before computers were helping. Not only aren't they hyphens, but they aren't minus signs either. And computers have both soft hyphens and hard hyphens. We sure use those little lines for a lot of purposes!
Here's a good set of notes about typesetting, including how the usage of the en dash and em dash differ in Europe:
http://home.swipnet.se/~w-20547/stylework/typograph1-en.html
As long as you brought it up, however, it is an interesting subject. The en dash and em dash came from typesetting, and were around long before computers were helping. Not only aren't they hyphens, but they aren't minus signs either. And computers have both soft hyphens and hard hyphens. We sure use those little lines for a lot of purposes!
Here's a good set of notes about typesetting, including how the usage of the en dash and em dash differ in Europe:
http://home.swipnet.se/~w-20547/stylework/typograph1-en.html
All I want is a list of the names of all of the various typsetting symbols. For example, I know that the # is called an octothorpe, and that
is called an ellipsis, and that & is an ampersand, and so forth, but what about % and @ and © and all the others? Surely most, if not all, have a name that is unknown to me.
I am SO glad that holiday is during the summer... my English teacher would have a ball if it was during the school year.
"Today we'll be discussing the reasoning behind every piece of punctuation in this story, in honor of national punctuation day!"
*nooooooooo!!*
"Today we'll be discussing the reasoning behind every piece of punctuation in this story, in honor of national punctuation day!"
*nooooooooo!!*
Apple Hobo said:
WOW!111! OMG WTF DA AOL TRANSL8R IS FANTASIC11!!1 OMG GREAT FIND APL3 HOBO!!11!1! OMG LOL
sorryiwasdreami said:
Almost looks like someone resurrected the old B!FF parser.
Whats next jive and valspeak?
