Common Spelling Errors

As a language arts teacher, I see misspellings so often, I think my brain has been damaged and my spelling skills are deteriorating. I ran into a gentleman a few days ago who read Loving the Rain, and he asked me point blank, “How do you spell rout when it applies to a blowout in a sporting event?” I replied, “r-o-u-t” and he said, “Correct. So why did you spell it r-o-u-t-e in your book?” I could only answer, “Because I’ve been a language arts teacher for 27 years and my brain is mush.”  He seemed to understand. However, I actually spell better than most people, and I happen to talk to people and read things they write quite often. Since I am the wielder of the “red pen” as my blog suggests, I’ve taken it upon myself to determine that there are quite a lot of words that people misspell, and it’s my duty to protect the sanctity of the dictionary and help out my fellow man. The following list of words is, well, absurd.

1.      Acrossed or acrosst instead of across. Like… I have acrossed to bear (don’t be afraid to groan at my feeble attempts at humor).

2.      Conversate instead of converse. Like… While I transmitate some ideas, you pay attentionate. Then, while you respondate, I’ll ignorate everything you say.

3.      Could of, would of, or should of instead of could’ve or would’ve or should’ve. I don’t know’ve and cannot think’ve spelling of with ’ve, so the opposite should be true as well.

4.      Alot instead of a lot. I'll let the following image speak for me. 

5.      Excetera or eck cetera instead of et cetera. Like…I expecially like to use excetera at the end of a sentence when I don’t know anything else, but I want people to think I do.

6.      Heighth instead of height.  Like… The breadth and width and length are all one-eighth of an inch too short, but the heighth (or is it hieghth?) is exactly one h too long.

7.      Interpretate instead of interpret. Like… I’m able to regurgitate spelling words and facilitate spelling lessons, but some day when I lose my mind, I may try to incapacitate the wrong-doer till (’til or until PLEASE) they finally interpretate my irritation.

8.      And while I’m at it, orientate and disorientate instead of orient and disorient are just as irritate-ing.

9.      I could care less instead of I couldn’t care less. Like… “Dude, I could care less. I care a little, you know, but if I chose to, I could care less. I’ve chosen to care a little, however—leaving room for less caring in the future.”

10.  Irregardless instead of regardless. Wikipedia (the Bible of word origins) says that this word probably came from Indiana unless it originated in South Carolina first. I swear it says that. Ir means “not” and less means “without” and regard means “concern,” so irregardless means “not without concern” which is the opposite of the intended meaning—irregardless of how it is used.

11.  Jewlery instead of jewelry.  Any jewlers out there? I asked Google to find me words that ended with lery while I tried to find a witty comment. A word that popped up was “jewellery.” I kid you not.

12.  Libary instead of library. The irony of this is that a library is filled with media that is filled with words, and libary isn’t one of them.

13.  Mute instead of moot. Like… I just made a mute point—“mute” as in that spelling is so dumb I’m speechless.

14.  Nother instead of other or another. Like… Let me make a whole nother point that we should learn to drop our a’s.  A person should be able to remain nonymous, and if we choose to not eat, we can be norexic. Maybe we could noint someone as king.

15.  Probly or probally or prolly instead of probably, and supposebly or supposelly instead of supposedly. I may have sevral diffrent theories about these spellings, but I’m too lazy to write them. (Yep, I’m still trying to drive you nuts).

16.  Sherbert instead of sherbet. I’m going to admit I hate saying “sherbet.” It feels wrong, but at least I know what its supposed to be (and since I just spelled it’s wrong, I should simply mention how much I detest people spelling you’re and they’re wrong also).

17.  Spade instead of spay. Like… He’s a good dog. I’d hate to hit him with a shovel.

18.  Speciality instead of specialty.  Now, using words such as extraterritoriality or inconsequentiality or bipotentiality might make a person sound like they have some intelligenciality, but speciality happens to make them sound silly.

19.  Volumptuous instead of voluptuous. Admittedly, some voluptuous women may be a bit lumpy, but that really is no excuse for this spelling.

20.  Wheelbarrel instead of wheelbarrow. Though barrow isn’t a common word, a barrel is a cask or keg or vat or drum. A keg on wheels is, well, a portable party, but it’s no way to do yardwork.

So there it is. Twenty words (if you don’t count my intentional blunders) for the general population to begin spelling correctly. That’s what “The Read Pin” is for, isn’t it?

The Power of Christmas

It has been a year of odd memories. At the end of August, I made one of those Planes, Trains, and Automobiles types of trips from Tennessee to Michigan. I wrote about it in “Murphy's Law and a Malicious GPS” and then a few weeks later suffered through knee surgery which I wrote about in “For the Love of Surgery.” Then my school year started and my father-in-law wandered off, starting six days of desperate searching and a resulting funeral. I wrote about my wife’s father in “Darwin J. Smith.” As things began to settle down, a deer committed suicide with my wife’s car and the day she got her vehicle back from repairs, she hit the front end of an idiot’s car with her stationary vehicle. My wife was going 0, the idiot about 60. Just a few days later, I got in the swing of things by denting in my daughter’s passenger-side door with the back end of my own moving vehicle. I mentioned the “incidents” in “Disaster Zone Ahead.” I thought my year of fun was over, and then we had an ice storm in Michigan and we lost our power—over Christmas!

With the passing of my father-in-law and my mother-in-law housed in a care facility with Alzheimer’s, my wife threw herself into Christmas preparations. I always had nice, family Christmases as a youngster, but the holiday with the Smith family was like Christmas times ten—maybe twenty. I’m fairly certain Jennifer was afraid that Christmas without her parents was going to be sad, so she was determined to honor the traditions with her best Christmas spirit. Well….

Christmas lights can’t be lit up without power. The Christmas tree can’t be lit up without electricity. Christmas carols can’t play on the stereo without energy. It’s difficult to wrap presents using an iPhone flashlight. We traditionally opened stocking stuffers on Christmas Eve and followed lots of traditions. The dip in the hot tub where we sang Christmas carols was out—the hot tub temperature was gradually receding from hot to frigid. The steaks broiled in the oven for our traditional meal became KFC. We took the generous financial gift that my parents had given us as a Christmas present, and instead of a new TV we were considering, we purchased a gas-powered generator so we could have enough heat in our house to keep the pipes from freezing. We didn’t have running water, so I bailed the chilly water from the hot tub to pour into the toilet tanks, and we brushed our teeth and washed our faces with bottled water. We ate our chicken and mashed potatoes, bundled up in my bedroom, watching our traditional Christmas movie. Our plan to have Jennifer’s family over to our house on Christmas Day was cancelled and plans were changed to go to her brother’s because their power had been restored. 

On Christmas morning, I awoke and made my trek to get more gas for the generator. We redirected extension cords so we could play our traditional Christmas music. After unwrapping gifts, we forsook the traditional breakfast cinnamon rolls because there was no oven, and we gathered our things to go shower at my brother’s house. At my brother-in-law’s house, we ate and prepared to open gifts, and just as we gathered for our first family Christmas without Jennifer’s parents, their power went out again. We unwrapped presents by candlelight and phone flashlights. Christmas wasn’t the same. It wasn’t convenient. It wasn’t traditional. It wasn’t what it usually was. But it was amazing.

Yes, gifts are awesome, and good food is appreciated. The comforts of home and the traditions of Christmas—too numerous to elaborate upon—are part of what makes Christmas special. But what makes Christmas truly special is the birth of Jesus. On Christmas Eve, because we didn’t have opportunity to celebrate how we usually do, we went to church. We sang Christmas carols and listened to our pastor talk about Jesus’s birth—the Christ of Christmas. We read the Christmas stories from the Bible together on Christmas morning. We thanked God for our meals. We gathered with family in the dark and were able to enjoy the experience without dwelling on the death of my father-in-law.

Christmas wasn’t the same. It was lacking in so many ways, but it allowed my family to focus on the right things. It allowed us to not be so caught up in the traditions that would have likely been a bit sad this year, and focus on our family and on the many blessings we often overlook—like heat and water and light. It helped us to ignore the hustle and bustle and not focus on the amenities of Christmas but rather on the reason for the special day. It allowed us to not be sad but rather to be grateful. I’ve had a lot of experiences this year that I’ll always remember, but the Christmas without power might have been the most memorable of all.

All-Time Favorites

It’s the time of year when everyone is making lists. Top ten’s. Best of’s. Well, it’s been a good reading year for me, but as I considered writing about my favorites, it wasn’t long before my mind was permanently fixed upon books that have impacted my life over time. I decided that since it’s my blog, I could write about my “best of’s” any way I wanted, so here are some books that have stuck with me long after I’ve read them.

The Bible. Forgive me, God, but some of the Bible is terribly boring. If anyone enjoys Leviticus, Numbers, and Jeremiah, I’d like to know why. However, after reading it many, many times, it has clearly impacted my view of life, my values, my purpose for living, and my heart.

Heaven by John McArthur. There’s a lot to not understand about God and His workings in the world, but to have the hope of Heaven makes it a lot easier to deal with. This book presented Heaven in such a way that not only do I have something to look forward to, but I have a better perspective on my purpose for being on earth as well.

Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe. My dad made me read this book. Crusoe was a guy who wasn’t an outdoorsman, wasn’t handy, and wasn’t equipped to live on an island alone for nearly thirty years, yet he did it. He never gave up hope. He learned how to do everything he needed to do. He was an inspiration to me that I also can do whatever I put my mind to do.

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. I’m often proclaiming that this is my favorite book. I connected with it. I learned from it. I was captivated by it. I’ve read it numerous times, and each time I finish I say, “That’s the best book I’ve ever read.” It’s one of only two novels that I choose to read over and over again.

This Present Darkness/Piercing the Darkness by Frank Peretti. As a young adult, it was these books that got me interested in fantasy. I was also fascinated by the dual, intertwined stories of people on earth and also angels and demons on a different realm, an element which I included in Jumper.

Holes by Louis Sachar and The Colorado Kid by Stephen King. The books have nothing in common except for the fact that each had such a unique plot, written so superbly, that when I was finished, I wished I had written them. These two books had a lot to do with my decision to write books of my own—especially the mysteries in Skeleton Key and Bulletproof.

The Great Train Robbery by Michael Crichton. This book has my favorite character—a bad guy protagonist. Crichton took a true story from the 1850’s and retold it as a novel, a novel which is the other book that I read over and over. I received another new copy for Christmas because I gave away my best copy and my used replacement was in terrible condition. What a fascinating story, mixing history with mystery and adventure. It should be a movie.

Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls and The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. Again, these books have nothing to do with each other, but I read one this year and one ages ago and both brought me to tears. Books can do that, you know? Books can be written so well and be so captivating that I can cry. It’s good to read books like that once in a while.

Loving the Rain by Jeff LaFerney. Yep, I egotistically chose my own book. But why not? I wrote a book! I sat down with an idea and the ideas kept coming and the plot and characters came alive. And I even made myself cry during one of the scenes. I woke up in the middle of the night with the ending. I got it published and people liked it. This book means the world to me because it was a risk I took, and I typed out a part of me that I didn’t know existed.

The World According to Garp and A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving. John Irving is a fantastic story-teller. His books ramble on and on in direction after direction. Characters are weird; their lives are weirder. His stories stick in my head and I can’t put his books down, and then somehow—miraculously—the whole story comes together—sometimes shockingly. These two books did it best. If I could write like someone, I’d choose John Irving.

Wish You Well by David Baldacci and A Painted House by John Grisham. These two well-known authors write thrillers and I’ve read many, many books by each, but these two novels divert from the norm. They’re historical, literary fiction. The stories are fabulous, showing a diversity and talent that impressed me. As a writer, I appreciate both of these stories immensely.

The Jewel Box by C. Michelle McCarty, Circle in the Sand by Lia Fairchild, Grade A Stupid by A.J. Lape, The Last Great Wizard of Yden by S.G. Rogers, Blue Bells of Scotland by Laura Vosika, The Aureate Spectacles: A Vampire Romance Novel by Eliott McKay, Embers at Galdrilene by A.D. Trosper, The Lie by Ashley Fontainne, Warrior of the Ages by S.R. Karfelt, Quest of the Dreamwalker by Stacy Bennett, Sheltering Palms by Preston Howard, Golden Blood by Melissa Pearl, Deja Blue by Julie Cassar, and Long Live the King by Guy Cote. These are indie authors all, and they’ve written very good books (I only listed one for each). These authors are my supportive, talented, funny, generous, intelligent, diverse friends whose books I treasure.

So that’s my year-end “best of” list. Choose any of those books to read and enjoy yourself. I hope you had a Merry Christmas and may the New Year bring you lots of stories to read and write.

Disaster Zone Ahead

I read a quote recently that said, “You can never be too far away from a disaster because there is no disaster-free zone in this entire universe.” I also stumbled upon the following words: “You can’t direct the wind, but you can adjust your sails.” It got me thinking about times when things have happened in my life that I just have to step back and laugh about. No one is exempt from bad things happening in his or her life, but how we respond to them is wholly our own decision. 

When I was in high school, both of my parents were teachers in my building. Believe it or not, there were more advantages to that situation than disadvantages. One time when I was sixteen years old, one of my classes was simply having a make-up work day, and since all my work was in, I asked my dad if I could take his car and go get something to eat. He said yes. On the way back to school, on the side street right beside the school campus, a driver with a limited brain capacity backed out of her driveway and ran into me as I was driving by. Now, admittedly, if I was a more experienced driver, it’s likely that I could have avoided this accident, but the driver was ticketed and our car was taken to the shop for repairs. On the day that we picked it up, as my dad was looking over his right shoulder and crossing one lane to turn left into another, a driver from the opposite side of the road was doing the exact same thing. They met in the middle in the form of a car collision. My dad turned the car around and drove it right back into the repair shop for a second round of restoration. I thought he would be mad at me since he blamed me for the first accident, but instead, he laughed about it. He shook his head and laughed. What a good example that was to me.

Author Kim Edwards said, “You can't spend the rest of your life tiptoeing around to try and avert disaster. It won't work. You'll just end up missing the life you have.” Sooo…about a week and a half ago, my wife hit a deer on the way to work. It smashed in the front of her car. The car was in for a little over a week for repairs, costing us one hundred dollars for the comprehensive deductible. The day she picked it up, while stopped with her turn signal blinking and while waiting for traffic to pass so she could make a left turn, a lady smashed into the back of her car going about fifty-five or sixty miles per hour. I had just been lamenting to my son recently about how expensive our auto insurance was. For a family of four who had no points on our licenses, no accident claims for nearly twenty years, and no tickets, it was absurd how much we were paying for insurance. I actually said, “We sure don’t get our money’s worth.” Well, now we do. My wife was the model positive example through all this. If she complained, it wasn’t to me. She actually said to me, “Did I tell you the good news? The insurance company called and said we wouldn’t have to pay any of the deductible. This accident is cheaper than the last one!” 

Author Delphine de Vigan wrote: “In books there are chapters to separate out the moments, to show that time is going by and things are changing, and sometimes the parts even have titles that are full of promise—'The Meeting', 'Hope', 'Downfall'—like paintings do. But in life there's nothing like that, no titles or signs or warnings, nothing to say 'Beware, danger!' or 'Frequent landslides' or 'Disillusion ahead.’ In life you stand all alone in your costume, and too bad if it's in tatters.” In some ways, de Vigan is right. Do you realize that in 1997, eight individuals cracked their skulls when falling asleep while throwing up in a toilet? Did you ever hear about poor Willy Thevessen who threw his Christmas tree out of a third floor window? The problem was that somehow he managed to throw himself out of the window too. I woke up early one morning many years ago with a back ache. My “back ache” was actually a kidney stone. Now, I’m a pretty tough guy. I had rotator cuff surgery on a Tuesday and went to work on Wednesday. But kidney stones are debilitating. Once I realized I needed to go to the emergency room, I made phone calls to take care of school lesson plans and to inform the varsity basketball coach that I probably wouldn’t be coaching the JV that evening. When I finally made it back to our bedroom in full expectation of my wife being ready to hurry me to the hospital, I found her lying on the bathroom floor, passed out with her head between the toilet and the sink. I could hardly breathe, and there was my wife unconscious on the floor. She was my ride! She woke up, passed out again, and woke up again soaked in sweat. She let me know that she had to take a shower before we could leave, and that we had to take the kids to her parents before we went to the hospital. Looking back on it now, I can laugh about the extended pain, and about the ride on my hands and knees in the back of the van (because it was the best position I could manage). Everything’s good now, and apparently I now know what it’s like to have a baby. There were no warning signs about any of those example tragedies.

Sometimes, however, warning signs exist. I saw on a tractor (excavator) a warning sign that said, “Danger: Avoid Death.” I was grateful for the warning. Who knows, maybe it saved my life. On a fuel tank cap, it said, “Never use a lit match or open flame to check the fuel level.” That sounded like very sound advice, regardless of the fact that I normally check my fuel level with my gas gage on the dashboard.  On a child's buggy, it said, “Remove Child Before Folding.” I don’t think I would have forgotten. I appreciate the road sign that said, “Beware of Road Surprises.” Another said, “Caution:  Water on Road During Rain.” Another said, “Road May Be Subject to Sudden Catastrophic Sinkhole Collapse.” Another said, “Danger: Blasting Zone.” Is anyone motivated to drive their vehicles through blasting zones and sinkhole zones to test their survival? Yes, sometimes there are warning signs, but it’s the tragedies that have nothing to do with common sense that I’m writing about. It is the situations that happen because we live the human existence and there’s no way to avoid them.

Mark Twain once said, "Humor is tragedy plus time." We look back at our tragedies, and with time and distance we can often laugh about them. It’s great that we can look back at life optimistically and even gratefully or humorously. But how do we deal with catastrophe or disaster at the moment it happens? Like my dad? Like my wife? The great philosopher Marilyn Monroe once said, “I believe everything happens for a reason. People change so that you learn to let go. Things go wrong so that you learn to appreciate them when they are right….And sometimes, good things fall apart so better things can fall together.”

Chuck Swindoll once said, “Words can never adequately convey the incredible impact of our attitudes toward life. The longer I live, the more convinced I become that life is ten percent what happens to us and ninety percent how we respond to it.” Yes, we are never far from a “disaster zone,” and since we can’t “direct the wind,” we must learn to “adjust [our] sails.” We can’t “tiptoe” around life trying to “avoid disasters.” We must take them head on. Our attitudes in life show our strength of character. Our attitude determines whether we are bitter and unhappy or optimistically ready to meet new challenges and share our experiences to help other people. We only have one life. We must “stand all alone in [our] costume…[even] if it's in tatters.” Life happens to us. There is no stopping it. The question is, how do we respond to it?

Best Parade Ever

Have you ever run a marathon? You know, 26.2 miles of agony? If you haven’t, it probably just means you aren’t crazy. If you have, not only are you nuts, but you’re probably incredible. My wife, brother, and sister-in-law ran the Detroit Free Press/Talmer Bank Marathon on Sunday, October 20. It started at 7 am, which meant we got up at 3:30 in the morning to go. It was 44 degrees when the run started. I didn’t run it because, well, I possess a modicum of common sense, and after knee surgery, my doctor told me I had to stop running. I might have been disappointed if I had any interest in destroying my body.

I stood at the race’s end, waiting for my family to show up. I saw numerous people begin weeping when they saw the finish line. It was touching when couples held hands. A guy in a penguin suit encouraged the crowd into cheers. Two women in super-hero costumes finished together. One runner wrapped herself in her county’s flag as she ran the homestretch. Everyone who started the race wearing garbage bags (and there were loads of them for some reason) finished without them. Several children ran out and finished the race with parents. My wife finished with numerous blisters on her feet, hip pain, and the bold statement that she would never do that again.

Along the 26.2-mile route, bands played and kindhearted souls cheered on the runners, offering jellybeans, M & M’s, Jolly Ranchers, Chex Mix, water, Gatorade, orange slices, and beer. Beer? I thought alcohol caused dehydration? Maybe the beer chuggers were hoping to get inebriated so they wouldn’t feel so much pain. Various signs portrayed encouraging words. One sign that was hard to ignore said, “Smile if you’ve pooped yourself.” I wonder if the beer drinkers even cared? Another said, “Does my T-shirt make my butt look fast?” Men of the world: you could answer that question with a yes. One busty onlooker held a sign that said, “Of course I’m an organ donor. Who wouldn’t want a piece of this?” A male onlooker’s sign said, “You have great stamina. Give me a call.” One blatantly honest sign stated, “You run better than the government.” A T-shirt said, “If you can read this, it means I’m not last.” One sign said, “Toenails are for sissies.” Another said, “Run faster. The Kenyans are drinking all the beer.” My favorite was, “This is the worst parade I’ve ever been to.”

But in a way, it really was quite an awesome parade. I asked my wife if she was glad she did it. She hesitated and said yes. Yes, because she could say she did it, and yes, because she helped raise money to provide clean drinking water for the needy in Africa. When I asked her if she’d do it again, she said—and I quote—“Never in a million years.” I had my suspicions she wasn’t completely crazy. But in that parade of parades people proved the human spirit. They attained an accomplishment that was absurdly ridiculous to say the least. Something torturous, nearly debilitating, and mentally agonizing was completed. Everyone who finished was a winner. Everyone who trained for months and finished the run completed the goal. If they could survive that madness and succeed, what can’t they do? And amazingly, a huge number of participants were there, not for themselves, but for others. Numerous groups were there in support of various charities. Thousands of runners shed gloves and hats and jackets, leaving them in the streets for volunteers to pick up and donate to the homeless shelters. Other groups did things like my wife, brother, and sister-in-law who raised nearly $3,000.00 for clean drinking water. It again showed that people can be generous and selfless. They tortured themselves so people they didn’t even know could wear some warm clothes or drink some clean water. I saw that the human spirit is alive and well. I was able to witness an exhibition of the good in mankind in the parade of parades, and I’m proud of my wife and the other participants who helped to renew my faith in people. And isn’t that what a parade is—a celebration of some kind? The marathon in Detroit was a celebration of the human spirit.