Writers Tricks of the Trade Issue 3 Volume 9 | Page 20

W ATCH O UT FOR T HOSE T RICKY
W ORDS
H AL M ORRIS WWW . GRUMPYEDITOR . COM
Thanks to former LA Times and Los Angeles Mirror reporter and columnist, Hal Morris, who hangs out
at www.grumpyeditor.com these days, here are more tips for writers.
EF Education First, a Lucerne, Switzer-
land-based international education com-
pany that specializes in language train-
ing, has zeroed in on 10 tricky English
words that writers can easily misspell or
misuse.
I
add one to make it 11.
My suggestions on how to distinguish
them.
N ECESSARY . Do two "c's" go with two "s's"?
No. Necessary is an indispensable item.
Make it one "c" and two "s's."
S TATIONARY V S . S TATIONERY . “Stationary”
means not moving while “stationery” refers
to office supplies like pencils, erasers, pa-
per and envelopes.
S EPARATE . Although it sounds like “seper-
ate,” only separate ---meaning to set or
F ALL 2019
keep apart contains a rat sequence among
its letters.
A FFECT V S . E FFECT . What compounds usage
here is one definition for affect in the dic-
tionary is "to produce an effect on." But af-
fect refers to action, while effect's prime
meaning is "anything brought about by a
cause or agent; result."
E MBARRASSED . This is among words with
double letters. In this case, remember it's
two "r's" and two "s's."
COMPLIMENT V S . COMPLEMENT. A com-
pliment is something positive that someone
says about another person, whereas a com-
plement is something that adds to or com-
pletes something else.
A CCOMMODATION . Another word with two
sets of double letters. Remember, it con-
tains two “c's" and two "m's."
P AGE 16
W RITERS ’ T RICKS OF THE T RADE