Posing As Normal© The Humor of Mary Tompsett

A Word on Vowel Movements ........Dude. Ever notice that LIVE spelled backwards is EVIL? Whoa.... ........On the lighter side, here’s an exercise from the Grammar Goddesses, a member of who I are. Can you shrink the word Little and correctly punctuate it? We see the word all the time with apostrophes flung anywhere. Hint: An apostrophe is like a mud print left by one or more fleeing letters. ........Apostrophes appear in contractions, when is not drops to isn’t or do not shrinks to don’t. Now, some shocking news: Plurals do NOT generally need apostrophes. Yikes!! This may bother some people, but hobos, ballerinas and anacondas can scamper naked through sentences in all fifty states—legally! Toss in a little ownership and suddenly we’re up to our loofahs in hobos’ pajamas, ballerinas’ tattoos, and anacondas’ knees. ........Please don’t leave, I have better material. The Smiths breed llamas and pumas for zoos, but the Nelsons and Joneses remain childless. Looser jeans might help. Anyway, all the plurals are correct! I know you think they don’t look right. Just put down the pen, sir. Slooooowly. Now step back. Easy…I’m here to help. ........Forming plurals can be tricky with words that already end in S, such as businesses, princesses, and what’s that other one...oh yeah, feceses. Linguists debate this last plural, so I say we go with poop. ........Apostrophes also show ownership, assuming they keep up with the payments. Bill has a tutu. We shorten this to Bill’s tutu. And if Bill owns more than one tutu, we say Bill’s tutus. Tutus – can that be right?? Oh, you betcha! Bill can wear dozens of tutus and needs no apostrophe from anyone. Some might say Bill’s bananas. Do they mean he has bananas? Now why would anyone think he has bananas when we’ve been talking tutus, for petesakes! Or do they mean Bill is bananas? Dunno. And with my history, I’m in no position to call anyone bananas. ........If we don’t squander apostrophes on plurals, we’ll have oodles left to mark where letters slithered out of other words. Those missing letters are often but not always vowels. We of the literary upper crust refer to this malady as Irritable Vowel Syndrome. ........Irritable Vowel Syndrome often afflicts writers, producing cramps in their writing style, bloated paragraphs, and irregular word flow. Writers’ prose may become either so blocked up or so loose that authors dare not leave home. Yes! Writer’s block! Journalists understand that colon motility is linked to vigorous, timely vowel movements. Ergo, respect the colon: dots with clout. ........O mine readers, art thou weary of picky grammar rules? Amen, brother! Does thee long for complete words? I hear ya, sister!! Don’t y’all be cryin’ ’n thinkin’ you’re alone, ’cause you ain’t! ........What to do? Identify specific triggers for your irritable vowels by learning common possessives and contractions. Plan ahead, allowing extra time for punctuation. Avoid embarrassment by writing short sentences at smaller intervals. When traveling, note the locations of all English teachers. And accommodate those frequent, urgent trips to the pencil sharpener by always choosing an aisle seat. ........Okay, amigos, wanna try the high dive? Buffy could of left some potato’s for us, but no. Hmm. Buffy could of?? I think the Buffster could’ve kept her greedy mitts off the potatoes. Also, I wish she’d ’ve aten the apostrophe. To, you know…aid her vowel movements. ........We return now to the Little contraction thingy. No, really, ’twill be great fun. What do you mean, this is boring? C’mon, sling them apostropheses! ........Oy vey. Im run’n out of patient’s, but were goin to finish this if it kill’s me. Okay, hear go’s! The contraction of Little is: (1) ‘Lil (2) Lil’ (3) ‘Lil’ or …wait! Are you leaving?? ........Oh hell, let’s change Little to Small and call it a day. Living with irritable vowels is no picnic, and grammar accidents will happen. ........’Tis ’nuff, li’l darlin’, to make us all f’ckin’ cuckoo.