This is the Opposite of Me!

I cringed when I read this comic…

My first rule of good writing is to be clear! Send me an email requesting my essay on the subject. I mention it on the right.

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Two examples of two in a row in the cartoon; second and third panels:

You might know that technically, the word that looks like a preposition is really an adverb when you have a separable verb (such as “put up” and “stress out.”) And these adverbs can go at the end of a sentence, such as “put ’em up” and “Don’t stress me out.”

But what about when you have more than one? The kid’s “up with” feels like an adverb, but the teacher’s “over” feels like a preposition. After all, she could have ended the sentence with “over this.” That gives “over” an object. Maybe we have some flexibility here. The longest series of prepositions I know of is five:

Come on up to over by the picnic table.

Where would you say the adverbs stop and the prepositions begin? Can you come up with a longer series? Feel free to put something in the comments.

I have to discipline myself not to answer unasked questions about grammar mistakes. Here’s the comic:

Now. How many of you wondered about the title to this post having “me” instead of “I”? After all, technically, linking verbs get predicate nominatives, not direct objects. But “This is I” sure sounds unnatural.

I think the grammatical solution would be to change the whole sentence to something like “This is something I would be tempted to do.” Yeah, it’s not as concise, and short headlines are generally better. Besides, using “me” gives me a point of grammar to write about!

Most compound adjectives are two words connected by a hyphen. But occasionally, more than two words are necessary. Here’s the passage:

So should we use four hyphens? You could.

I’ve posted this topic a bunch of times, but I just ran into two examples, so I better mention it again.

and—

In case the errors aren’t immediately obvious to you, here’s the rule:

• When you’re comparing two things, use the comparative form: better.
• When you compare three or more things, use the superlative form: best.

This error is so common, it’s probably a losing battle, but still…

You saw the errors, right?