Hello, Gentle Reader. First of all, let me apologise for the length of time betwixt posts. It has been, paradoxically, both a quiet time and a hectic time. I say 'quiet' because I kept a reasonably low profile over Christmas and New Year; I figured businesses would be quiet and/or running with skeleton staff, so there would be little point to approaching them for work. Conversely, it has been a busy time because I had to attend to other work and submit two university assessments.
The lull between posts has seen me despairing over the lack of Oxford commas in articles - and it must be said, I am a firm believer in the Oxford comma - as well as misused homophones. I have also gnashed my teeth and wrung my hands at opening dependent clauses missing their required commas. If you think I am ardent on the placement of commas, you are correct; at the age of six, I took on a nun who crossed out the comma I had put in my sentence about my dog's dietary preferences. 'Sister, it's supposed to be a comma,' I protested. Like most of the children, I was afraid of this nun, but hey, she had messed with my punctuation! In response, the nun roared, 'It's supposed to a SENTENCE!' Um, hello? It had predicate, pronoun, verb, nouns, and appropriate conjunction, all syntactically correct. All I could think was that she must have been wearing her veil too tightly.
I have resumed tutoring for the school year. One of the subjects is protest themes in literature and other art. The students are looking at Dr Martin Luther King's famous speech, the transcript of which is one of the most stirring things I have ever read. They must also analyse the cover of U2's War album (it's the black and white photograph depicting a child in a combat helmet, with album's title in red letters). I wonder if the teacher holds the same derogatory view of Bono that many others do?
Well, that's me for now. I have some pottering about to attend to; among things, we are renovating here, so the house is beyond shambolic. I must also prepare for the upcoming Indie Festival in a nearby town.
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