"Drums in the deep..."

Experimenting with the new Blogger features, I set up my profile, but it doesn't seem to be working quite yet. Actually, a lot of things between me and the new Blogger are not working quite yet... For instance, I can't sign out of my dashboard page, which is a problem, because I work on a number of my friends' blogs, and now I can't get to their templates! I feel like one of those doomed dwarves of Moria: "We cannot get out. We cannot get out..."


my own new feature
Okay. Since so many of my friends seem to be writers (Fancy that!), and so many of them seem to ask me to edit their work, I thought it was time I helped them understand the logic behind all those dismaying red marks I smear all over their precious manuscripts. Yes, folks, there is logic behind it, and not mere bitchiness-- there are rules we editor-types follow, and once you know and understand them, it's really easy to resolve and avoid all those irksome issues of grammar and punctuation, and thereby stop giving Nikki a headache. Ready? Read on!

Grammar and Punctuation : its and it's
Lots of people get these confused, but the rule is actually simple. "It's" is a contraction of "it is", while "its" is a possessive pronoun.


e.g.
It's the dog's bowl. (It is the bowl of the dog.)
That's its bowl. (That is the bowl which belongs to it.)


When in doubt, mentally substitute "it is" for the word in question, and see if it makes sense. (I.e., "That's it is bowl" clearly does not make sense!)