You know, now that I think about it, really, it doesn't make any sense.

[taste_is_sweet]

What the hell is it with me and commas? Seriously, it's like I'm personally responsible for the health and well-being of the damn things. If I'm not paying attention I start spraying them all over whatever I'm writing with very little logic and almost no sense that I can think of. Seriously, at least half the time I don't even put them where I'd actually take a breath if I was reading the sentence out loud. And yet, there they are.

I thought I'd gotten over this little...problem about three years or so ago around the same time I stopped (mostly) repeating stuff for emphasis. But I just re-read something that I posted just a few months ago, and there they are again: Commas. Too many of them. Either I somehow didn't think they needed removal the first time around, or they bred in my WIP folder while I wasn't looking. Maybe I need the digital equivalent of AMDRO.

Or maybe, just maybe, I need to pay more attention, when I write.

Comments

[rinkafic.livejournal.com]

I, have, comma,issues, too!

Feeling your pain!

[taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'm so very, very, very glad, I'm not, entirely, alone! ;->

[sgamadison.livejournal.com]

No, I have the same problem with commas. I used to know what I was doing, got confused, and now just toss fistfuls at a sentence and hope some of them land in the right places. On rare occasions I can go back later and wonder what I was thinking, but most of the time if I think about it too much, I'll screw it up. :-)

[taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com]

I kind of do it by feel, which can't be any more accurate. :) Most of the time I just try to not use them as much as possible.

[reedfem.livejournal.com]

Maybe, it's a, Canadian, thing.

[taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com]

LOL ::rolls eyes::

[natsuko1978.livejournal.com]

I do the same thing. Or else, I seem to forget about the damn things entirely. And I always have this huge issue with commas and conjunctives (if that's the word I'm looking for) because of old English teachers dinning it into my head that since a comma is a clausal conjunctive it shouldn't be used with other clausal conjunctives... but then sometimes you need a pause before an and/or/but clause... and then I lose my head entirely. *sigh*

Why is English such a difficult language? God editors and/or beta readers are the only cure, but Americans tend to get annoyed about the British lack of use of Oxford commas and then the whole thing degenerates into a debate about whether British or American usage is "right", when, of course, both are, just in different circumstances. All very wooly, what?

[taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com]

I honestly don't even know what grammar style I learned in school (that would be university; grammar wasn't taught beyond grade school in the 80s). My guess is British because it was in Canada, but for all I know it might have been American.

And of course now I've been in the US and writing so much here for so long that I'm sure that either my grammar is all American usage, or some strange hodge-podge of Canadian/British and American.

Mostly I wing it and hope for the best. :D

[wpadmirer.livejournal.com]

I do the exact same thing, and yes, when I read it, I realize it's where I would take a breath.

Hence the former sentence. (grin)

[taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but with you it looks natural! :D

[mific.livejournal.com]

Me too. I'm better at writing them instinctively, but then I obsess with the self-betaing later and take some out. Then put a few back again. Then re-read the story months larer and think, damn, should have been a comma in there. *sigh*

[taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com]

LOL

Yes. That. Exactly. :D

[ribbon-purple.livejournal.com]

Oh, darling. You're not the only one. If you hadn't noticed, I'm a comma-crazy fiend (semicolons aren't safe either)! :)

*MASSIVE HUG*

[taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com]

Semicolons are my sometime boyfriends. :D

Massive hugs to you too! (or is that, "you, too!"?)

[illariy.livejournal.com]

In German, I am much better about it but in English, the various practices in American vs British English have me confused and I end up using a comma basically every time I want to indicate a pause in speech regardless of rules. Oops?

By the way, your icon cracked me up. *giggle*

[taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com]

Thank you. :D It was made by moira_faeii, though her journal doesn't seem to exist anymore. Or I could have spelled her LJ name wrong.

I wish I had any rules to help you with! I do pretty much the same thing as you, and hope that most of it is correct. I also have really good betas. :D

[illariy.livejournal.com]

I don't write stories (anymore) so it doesn't matter as much and betaing LJ comments would likely be overkill, hehe.

*sprinkles commas liberally all over lawn*