Am I the only curmudgeon who can’t get past the extra space after periods in a post about punctuation?
Ugh—and to think that extra effort had to be put in place to allow that to happen, too.
Regarding the Em Dash
21–30 of 219 posts
Re: Regarding the Em Dash
#22The em dash is the most beautiful punctuation mark, all the more because it is rare --- and it is best kept that way. Certainly a sentence with more than two is imparsible. In fact, more than a few in a whole article is probably getting annoying. It's like the exclamation point in that way. Once you discover the em dash, it is hard to restrain yourself. But I'm trying to come back to the comma. It does its work witho…
Two dashes are an en dash or a range for me --- so 1--3 is my hyphen encoding count range!
Re: Regarding the Em Dash
#23Am I the only curmudgeon who can’t get past the extra space after periods in a post about punctuation?
Nope. Raging against double-spaces post-period was all the rage a few years back[1], so I'm sure it raises quite a few curmudgeonly hackles. [1] http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2011/01/...
My sixth grade teacher cured me of this right quick. “Pick up a book,” she said, “—go on.” I did so. I looked up at her but she just looked back down at me. I opened the book. I looked at the spacing. I closed the book, looked back up at my teacher and said, simply, “I see.”
Re: Regarding the Em Dash
#24Tip: On a Mac, you can type an em-dash with shift-option-hyphen. (An en-dash is just option-hyphen.)
There are a few reasons why I switched from PC to Mac, but there's only one reason I'll never switch back—it's this em-dash shortcut.
Also for me:
Opt-P for Pi π Opt-8 for Bullet • Opt-Shift-8 for Degree °
(And there are simple, memorable shortcuts for Pounds, Cents, Yen, Euro, Trademark, Copyright, Ohms, Infinity, and lots of math notation...)
Re: Regarding the Em Dash
#25Am I the only curmudgeon who can’t get past the extra space after periods in a post about punctuation?
Nope. Raging against double-spaces post-period was all the rage a few years back[1], so I'm sure it raises quite a few curmudgeonly hackles. [1] http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2011/01/...
I am an unapologetic curmudgeon who uses two spaces. Or rather, my right thumb does. I learned to type on an IBM Selectric, I use mostly mono-spaced fonts, and two spaces after a full stop makes perfect sense. I went thirty years between learning it and thinking about it, and then some point-and-drool twee bloggers made it unfashionable.
Re: Regarding the Em Dash
#26The em dash is the most beautiful punctuation mark, all the more because it is rare --- and it is best kept that way. Certainly a sentence with more than two is imparsible. In fact, more than a few in a whole article is probably getting annoying. It's like the exclamation point in that way. Once you discover the em dash, it is hard to restrain yourself. But I'm trying to come back to the comma. It does its work witho…
I put spaces around mine. I’m not sure if that’s the norm — let alone correct usage — but it tends to help readers differentiate it as a non-compound word structure.
Re: Regarding the Em Dash
#27I used to be an em dash over-user but have calmed down quite a bit in that department over the last several years. My current idée fixe is the archaic ellipsis as (over) used by Céline . . . I just can't bring myself to go with the single character scrunchy version.
Ah man, … as a single character is the best. I believe on a Mac it’s shift-alt-;
I’m on my iPhone right now so I can’t verify my muscle memory.
Re: Regarding the Em Dash
#28The em dash is the most beautiful punctuation mark, all the more because it is rare --- and it is best kept that way. Certainly a sentence with more than two is imparsible. In fact, more than a few in a whole article is probably getting annoying. It's like the exclamation point in that way. Once you discover the em dash, it is hard to restrain yourself. But I'm trying to come back to the comma. It does its work witho…
> I land on the side favoring a space on each side of the dash.
Horrible; if you are going to set a dash open and use it for the purpose of an em-dash, use an en-dash.
Setting an em-dash open is ugly as hell.
> I prefer to ASCII-encode my em dashes with three hyphens.
Two-hyphens is conventional for an en-dash. Since a set-open en-dash serves the same purposes as an em-dash, a lot of people just use that instead of the three-hyphen conventional encoding of an em-dash.
Some people use set-open hyphens on ASCII in place of dashes, which is actually probably the best thing in a monospace presentation but ugly in proportional fonts.
Re: Regarding the Em Dash
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nope. Raging against double-spaces post-period was all the rage a few years back[1], so I'm sure it raises quite a few curmudgeonly hackles. [1] http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2011/01/...
My sixth grade teacher cured me of this right quick. “Pick up a book,” she said, “—go on.” I did so. I looked up at her but she just looked back down at me. I opened the book. I looked at the spacing. I closed the book, looked back up at my teacher and said, simply, “I see.”
That selfsame teacher admonished me for turning in a creative writing assignment with single sentence paragraphs in dialog: “Paragraphs consist of a topic sentence, supporting arguments, and a concluding statement,” she insisted. I looked up at her, “But... books—!” She wouldn’t have it. “When you write a 40,000 word novel you can use one sentence paragraphs.” So, 19 years later, I did.
Re: Regarding the Em Dash
#30I use mdash for "side thoughts", such as:
It turned green—like I care.
He kicked that person's butt—quite hard actually—without thinking of the repercussions.