WDAF provides a life lesson for the last remaining good people in the Golden Ghetto. It's never easy changing stereotypes and I've always thought that most of JoCo would just as well see their fellow humankind croak then do so much as lift a finger to help somebody out. Turns out . . . A dude who tried to disprove this conception got a horrible beating for his trouble:
"Overland Park Police are searching for three people involved in a weekend attack. Officers said a man stopped near 69 highway & 199th Street on Saturday night to help a woman with a flat tire. Once the man got out of the car, 2 men jumped out of the car with the flat tire and started attacking the good Samaritan."
Again, I don't approve of violence and this is kind of disheartening because it hurts all of us trying to take advantage of the the people of JoCo.
Most of the incidences you say the word 'fail' are inappropriate uses. Try not to be so trendy and communicate well.
ReplyDeleteFail's not going to catch on as a solo word. I'm sure you think you're a trendsetter, but you're not going to make it so. I remember when you first commenter used it and it was lame when SHE said it!
It's very uncool to overuse trendy words, especially ones that are passe. Like "To wit". "Anyhoo", correctly "anywho" and the others you seem to structure sentences just to work them in.
Real journalists avoid cliches like "think outside the box". Don't ya wanna just STUFF people who use that phrase INTO a box?
or "threw his hat into the ring". That is so small town journalism.
And the word 'gubernatorial race' when its more simple to just say 'governor's race".
Radio people, who mindlessly just read wire copy verbatim, should be fined fifty dollars for reading "AP-speak"!
Seriously, T, don't use ANY pet words. Say what you mean.
I'm not the greatest writer, for I write too quickly and don't edit my own material as I write it, but I know not to use cliches and overused words. Duh? (Did I say "DUH?") (grin)
Moreover, words and phrases are overused as soon as they hit the national media. That's when really cool people dump them.
I have a couple great books for writers, not that I follow all their rules. One's "ELEMENTS OF STYLE" which all writers should read, and the other's a book by the late Rudolf Floesh, called "How to Write Speak, and Think Effectively."
Floesch's book was given to me by a news director who was tired of me writing radio scripts as if I was writing for a publication. He got great notoriety for teaching lawyers how to write 'PLAIN ENGLISH' legislation.
he dissected how poeple talk over the backyard fence and suggested we all write that way. I do. yes, its not TIGHT WRITING like "elements of style" but if you analyze conversation, people dont talk TIGHT. They repeat, rephrase and are verbose... to be better understood.
I think tight writing is oversold. People don't talk that way but it's good for the printed word where economy of wording is a virtue.
In oral speech, it's not. Listen closely to your mom or a talk show artist and you'll see lots of repetition, incomplete sentences, run on's... it's how we all talk to each other.
Me, I TALK to my computer. Ya want tight writing, go read the New Yorker where contributors use a lot of big words you have to look up!
Roger that?
^^ Fail
ReplyDeleteI want to shoot my hot cream all over Paris Hilton's face!
ReplyDeleteThe fact that you keep calling JoCo the Golden Ghetto demonstrates to people that you are jealous of those people who have a purpose in life. The fact that you try to stereotype those people is just a shallow attempt to acknowledge that you feel that they are truely better than you (which they are) Johnson County is nationally recognized as one of the best places to live in the U.S. It's interesting to read your blog once every 6 months and see that the stories never change. YOu have no depth in your pathetic attempt to inform people what's truely going on in the KC area.
ReplyDeleteFail
It actually is a very nice place. Clean roads, clean stores, very little ghetto riff raff, the police actually come within 10 minutes when you call, most everyone you meet has a job and pays taxes. It's revolutionary.
ReplyDeleteWhere they Mexican?
ReplyDelete