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The BUSKLAW Halloween 2022 Post: Stephen King's Asides on Poor Writing in Fairy Tale

  Having just read  Stephen King's Fairy Tale in time for Halloween, it's appropriate to examine his asides on poor writing included in the book. (BTW, Fairy Tale is a good read with King's typical well-executed character development, plot, and a great finish to the story. But you have like the whole Grimm fairy tale genre before you read his take on it.)  Stephen King doesn't tolerate anything less than crisp prose. When the story's hero, Charlie Reade, tries to read a book about the origins of fantasy and its place in the world matrix ("what a mouthful"), he can only scan it because: It was everything I hated about what I thought of as "hoity-toity" academic writing, full of five-dollar words and tortured syntax. Maybe that's intellectual laziness on my part, but maybe not. Later on, Charlie tries to focus on a particular chapter in the "origins of fantasy" book about the story of Jack and the Beanstalk but is put off by "t
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The BUSKLAW 2021 Year in Review - Brit English Sums It Up!

  I'm at a loss to describe 2021 using American English, sorry. AmE has grown tiresome. Don't believe me? Just turn on your local TV news and listen for how many times the news people use "prior" instead of "before" and pepper their speech with "as well," frequently tacking it on after using "also" in the same sentence, as in "It will also rain tomorrow as well." How can all be WELL when every other sentence ends with AS WELL? Warning: don't play a drinking game to count the number of  AS WELLs or you'll be pished (as they say in Scotland) in 10 minutes. Which reminds me of why we should be thankful for Brit English to describe 2021: it was another year that we good guys got knackered .   Consider: Covid continues unabated - now improved with variants (get your booster, wear a mask)! The peaceful transition of the U.S. government after the 2020 presidential election almost didn't happen (can you say "insurrectio
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The BUSKLAW December Newsletter: Finding the "Good" on Xmas (and Nouns That Must Remain Plural)

Some folks may believe that writing well and Christmas have little in common, but I dispelled that notion two years ago in  my post about writing well on Christmas . And I have uncovered additional evidence for this holiday season.  I wasn't looking for that evidence, but it popped up in a sales contract that I was reading. The line was something like, "If any Good is nonconforming...." Wait a second. How can the "Good" be non-conforming? Wouldn't that fall to the province of the "Bad"? Then it hit me: the drafter was using "Good" as the singular of "Goods," a term of art defined in the Uniform Commercial Code ("UCC"), the statute regulating the sale of Goods adopted by almost every State.  But not "Good." The UCC doesn't use that word. The reason is simple. Would you walk into your local dry cleaners and ask "Is my pant ready?" You would likely get a quizzical expression from the clerk who mi
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