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It's easy to remember to use a colon for salutations, "Dear Ms. Thinkssheknowseverythingaboutgrammar:"; for time, it's 5:00, I'm outta here; between the chapter and the verse in the Bible, Genesis 1:1-5 (forgive me God, for bringing up religion when I said I would avoid this controversial topic); and using "To:" or "From:" in a business memo or e-mail (I am NOT capitalizing the damned "e" as mentioned in a previous article).
Notice I used the semi-colon to separate the ideas in that long series that uses commas? I could've used a colon if I started it as "Remember to use a colon for the following: <long, dull list follows>." When you throw a list at us, it likely will need the double dots. Though grammatically correct, it is still confusing and ugly looking. For goodness sakes, use bullets instead.
The semi-colon is also properly used prior to "therefore," "however," and "moreover;" "thus" you would use this instead of a comma like you do with "and," "or," and "but." I think I am all quoted out here and my colon really hurts. OY!!
I am an editor of a nonprofit organization's newsletter. The spiritual leader of this organization makes my life heck. I'm not a wimp, like I am going to say "hell" in the same sentence as "spiritual." He always puts his punctuation on the outside of quotes like this: "Off with their heads"! It's not the recommended style for American English. However, British English typically uses punctuation on the outside. This is an example of where there is no hard and fast rule. It's best to go by the styles of your organization or company. Personally, it bugs me when the punctuation is outside except in the Lincoln example below. No offense to speakers of British English. I often write "humour," "theatre," and" colour" because I like it!
The only time it really goes on the outside of the quotes is when you use a colon (ouch, still hurts) or a semi-colon. Now brace yourself: question marks and exclamation marks go outside the quotes... sometimes!
If the punctuation applies to the quotation itself, then keep it in the family. Kick it out when the entire sentence is a question or exclamation.
Who said, "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that 'all men are created equal'"? Please don't write me an e-mail asking for the answer. I may end up laughing myself to death before writing a response.
The article has reached its word limit so I can't present any other pitiful examples of poor grammar. We will save the rest for a rainy day.
### About the author
Your teacher for the day, Ms. Meryl Two Syllables Not One, has been a Net freak since '93 and continues to whack herself for not getting into the Web biz much, much sooner. She does a little bit of everything freelance writing for The Dallas Morning News, Web designing, coordinating newsletters for Ibizhome http://www.ibizhome.com teaching an online class, volunteering, and explaining what a "process analyst" is to everyone who asks what is her day job. The day job, of course, isn't Web related and she's working to change that for good. You can reach out and touch Meryl at her Web Site: http://www.meryl.net or e-mail: meryl@onramp.net.
Now back to your regular scheduled programming with Principal King and Vice Principal Levy.
This article originally appeared in the Dec. 28, 2000 edition of the WebReference Update Newsletter.
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Revised: Dec. 29, 2000
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