Tora Writing

Category: Words

  • What Color is Your Language?

    What Color is Your Language?

    After writing my “Ode to the Thesaurus,” I started to think about how I could write a multitude of such Odes and have a great time. The problem is that I’d probably lose my readership. This left me at a bit of a loss for blog topics. Recently, I bought a second pack of colored…

  • Provocative Words

    Provocative Words

    Welcome to my “Ode to the Thesaurus.” One of my favorite Facebook pages is The Writer’s Circle. I always seem to glom onto their lists of Other Words For <fill in the blank>. I’ve several of them clipped into my Blog Ideas notebook in Evernote. One I’ve been looking at a lot lately is for…

  • Words That Don’t Work: Nonplus

    Words That Don’t Work: Nonplus

    I believe that a person with a basic understanding of the language ought to be able to understand content published for the general population – even if they encounter a word they haven’t seen before. Obviously, text books, scientific articles, philosophical debates, and the such are likely to contain words that will send the reader…

  • Properly Pronounce!

    Properly Pronounce!

    In a blog that I don’t think I’ll publish, I discussed the importance of proper pronunciation. That rant focused on how commonly people drop Rs from words such as “library” and “February.” And while I do find that tendency annoying, the blog itself was just a little too pissy – even for me. That said,…

  • Straight Talk, Not Buzzspeak

    Erika Napoletano is someone I stumbled upon a few years ago – don’t ask me how, I have no clue. I subscribe to her blog – I don’t read it often, but they all still live in my inbox. I love her work because she talks straight, thinks along the same lines I do, and…

  • Going Too Far with Gender Neutrality

    When being specific could be wrong, when referring to a person of unknown gender, it is better to be general than specific. And, job positions ought to be neutral. Male or female, someone is a server or a flight attendant. However, I believe people are taking gender neutrality too far. The idea for this blog…

  • Writing, Editing & Word Smithing

    I recently let my sister rant about the term Value Proposition and why it annoys her. And a very good rant it was. I try to allow my sister her opinions (like I have a choice) and yet, I must defend the term “wordsmith.” Jen defined “word-smithing” as editing. There’s actually more to it. Dictionary.com…

  • What’s Your Value Proposition? – Guest Blog

    Value (noun): Estimated or assigned worth; valuation Proposition (noun): a thing, matter, or person considered as something to be dealt with or encountered I am frequently the gate keeper between my employer and outside sales people. As such, I hear many sales pitches about how fantastic this widget is versus another widget. One term that…

  • Words that Bug Me: Irony

    I have previously ranted – and will rant again, I am sure – about words because I feel they are misused or I do not care for their meaning. “Irony,” however, does not fit into either of their categories. Instead, “irony” bugs me because I don’t get it. Occasionally, I know an example of it,…

  • What is a Paradigm Shift?

    Before we can have a shift, we need to know what a paradigm is. Once again, I went to my friend dictionary.com for the official definition. There were several, I’m listing the relevant one here: A framework containing the basic assumptions, ways of thinking, and methodology that are commonly accepted by members of a scientific…