Matthew, This is a minor crime, compared to what the writers of the
questionnaire were guilty of, but in number seven, "Avoid excessive use of
the exclamation mark, it gives
writing an air of childish innocence which is undesirable in this case,"
you have a comma splice. There should be some kind of conjunction after
"exclamation mark."
--A Fellow Grammar Nazi
----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Horspool" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "talk2" <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, August 10, 2007 12:00 PM
Subject: The Talk2 List Fw: File - NEW MEMBER'S QUESTIONARE
I was recently asked to join a biblical studies group. I didn't fancy it
but thought I might as well appease the moderator (I was tired at the time)
so I joined and promptly set their address to "treat as spam". Anyway, I
was sent a file called "new member's questionare" and, after laughing
uproariously for a while about the apawling English, sat down to respond to
it. Here is what I wrote:
----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Horspool" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Friday, August 10, 2007 4:53 PM
Subject: Re: File - NEW MEMBER'S QUESTIONARE
Hi,
Here is my questionnaire:
"Hi! We are happy to have you here. Before you continue with your
membership, we need you to just simply fill out this questionare form so
that we the moderators as well as all other members can get to know you
better."
Spelling: questionare, should be questionnaire.
"1. YOur name:"
Capitalization: YOur, should be Your.
Answer: Matthew Frank Horspool.
"2. Would you please give us your date of birth so that we can add it to
the calendar? Also annerverceries if any?"
Comment: could be made a little more concise.
Spelling: annerverceries, should be anniversaries.
Answer: Sunday, February 9, 1992 at 12:07.
"3. Email?"
Comment: house style is looking rather inconsistent. Perhaps a colon
rather than a question mark should be used here, also add the word
"address" for the sake of professional appearance. Though it is
generally accepted that Email is a word rather than a compound word of
which one is abbreviated, it is preferred to write it as "E-mail", where
the "E" stands for "Electronic", so as to avoid the expansion reading
"Electronicmail".
Answer: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
"4. Are you on any instant messengers? Such as msn or windows
messenger, yqhoo, skype, aim....etc. If you have any of those please give
your instant messanger address or screen name and with which system
provider."
Comment: badly punctuated, vocabulary is informal and lacks clarity
towards the end. This could be made more concise.
Capitalization: msn, should be MSN. windows, should be Windows. yqhoo,
should be Yqhoo. skype, should be Skype. aim, should be AIM.
Spelling: windows messenger, should be Windows ® messenger. yqhoo,
should be Yahoo! messanger, should be messenger.
Answer: Windows ® Live Messenger ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
"5. Give your State/Province and Country:"
Comment: The word "Please" would improve the question.
Answer: Birmingham, West Midlands, England.
"7. Just hang in there, because you are almost done! Now is your chance
to tell us a little more about yourself in 1 or 2 sentences! Feel free
to tell us anything about yourself!"
Comment: this question should be numbered "6", not "7". The vocabulary
is rather informal. Avoid excessive use of the exclamation mark, it
gives writing an air of childish innocence which is undesirable in this
case.
Answer: I am 15 years old and totally blind. I am currently at secondary
school year 11 studying English, Mathematics, Science, Information
Communication Technology, Music, French, Business Studies, Religious
Education, Personal/Social/Health Education and Physical Education. My
two main interests are Music and Computers, although I have several
others including Radio and the syntactical, grammatical and vocabulary
sectors of the English language. I am a member of the Church of England.
I attend church most Sundays as I sing in the choir. I am also a trainee
organist.
"Once again, thanks for joining us. If you have any questions, please
feel free to send an email to:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
, and we will answer any question you have.
With best regards,
Darlene and Carol B and Stephanie
group moderators"
Comment: lists delimited with "and" should be avoided.
Matthew
Did you miss a message? Well, don't.
http://www.mail-archive.com/talk2%40andrelouis.com/
has it for you. Never miss a Talk2 message again.
Did you miss a message? Well, don't.
http://www.mail-archive.com/talk2%40andrelouis.com/
has it for you. Never miss a Talk2 message again.
