The initial volley on my part, over a document someone else had written which is now on our cutting floor, seemed innocent enough:
I've removed all parenthetical speech (a curious, written form of stage whisper, this). In the many cases where a preposition was found at the start of the sentence it was terminated with prejudice. There were occasions where firm, declarative statements were made in one paragraph, then a bit further in the document there were statements made which, in some circumstances, might have been viewed as a possible equivocation regarding the particular concept. I only found 2 cases where a small integer number was in numeric form and they've been fixed as well.
The return was, of course, swift and merciless.
to boldly go (splitting infinitives without prejudice) on a journey of
edit-ification (a constructed word not to be used in any other context,
much like the 2000 gore-bush supreme court decision) requires the
courage to challenge syntax (not the tobacco & alcohol kind, but the
kind that your 11th grade grammar teacher was fond of [thereby ending
a thought with a preposition rather than forcing a strained construction on
the phrase{thus denying myself the pain of writing "of which your 11th grade
grammar teacher was fond}]), a clear focus on both purpose and goal, a
commitment to clarity and an absolute dedication to exploring the most effective means
of conveying complex thoughts and concepts without resorting to unnecessarily extended
and complex sentences, full of subordinate clauses, conjunctions and parenthetical
references (although there is certainly an argument for the clarification that
the use of parenthesis can bring to a rhetorical thread). that being said, i'll take
another shot at this late this afternoon.
enjoy your friday.
I am not sure if I should respond with limerick, haiku, or simply go hide under the covers with a flashlight and sharpen my skills for the next encounter with the edit-beast.