The 11th Hour- A Writing Secret

While some people think that procrastination is a bad thing, I tend to disagree. Not just because I am a bit of a procrastinator, but because I believe that most of great writing has come from doing it in the 11th hour. Now don't get me wrong, I think there is a lot to be said for being diligent in  proofreading and then proofreading again. However, I think when it comes to writing you should just let it all out first. Let the words flow from your brain to your paper (or computer screen). I have found that when I overthink my writing and the mechanics of what I want to say, I usually mess up. We are reviewing so many good grammar rules in here, so they will become more and more of a second-nature thing as we move along. Don't doubt yourself, get the words out and then come back to them, if needed. Don't be hasty, though, there will be times in that 11th hour that you make mistakes and will need to rework what you have done to make it grammatically correct.

On to the world of every day grammar mistakes. I found this gem on the overpass sign while driving on I-15 to work the other day: "Please drive safety." This should obviously read, "Please drive safely." I had to do my best not to grit my teeth after seeing that one, it seems like such an obvious mistake. I was really embarrassed for UDOT that day.

This next one is really bad and really uncomfortable because whoever typed up this sign definitely did not know what they were doing. I walked into the office next to us to see if I could use their copy machine since ours was out of ink. When I went into the copy room, I found a sign that said, "Please refill copy paper if it runs out. Thank you for your copulation." This person was probably unaware that "copulation" has to do with a sexual activity and probably meant to say, "Please refill copy paper if it runs out. Thank you for your cooperation." That one made me laugh extra hard.

Finally, this last one was (hopefully) a bit of a play-on-words by the creator but it made me cringe all the same. At the entertainment center, Toads, there was a sign that said, "Private customer parking only. All others will be toad." I cannot lie, I laughed but I also died a little on the inside because it is clever word puns like these that make our world illiterate. The sign should have said "towed" not "toad."