ESL General English Grammar Questions

Re: Fragmented sentences

Grammar Geek — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 20:08:17 GMT

I 'spected as much.

Re: Fragmented sentences

Avangi — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 15:20:32 GMT

I was kidding.

Re: Fragmented sentences

Grammar Geek — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 12:46:45 GMT

I'm not too worried about the owneres of the Piggly Wiggly in Marked Tree, Arkansas, coming after me 15 years after the deed was done.

(All you have to do is say "Piggly Wiggly" to my sister and she starts laughing to this day, though.)

Re: Fragmented sentences

New2grammar — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 04:46:10 GMT

Thanks for the sharing, Avangi. That's interesting.

Re: Fragmented sentences

Avangi — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 04:32:44 GMT

New2grammar
By the way, Is your last post for me? "be sure to shred the paperwork"

Actually, that one was for GG. In LA, illegal dumping is a huge problem, since it's very expensive to dispose of stuff. If you have junk to get rid of which won't fit in the residential containers the city provides - or qualify for "large item pickup" - you can spend $200 to have it hauled privately. So people often leave it on a quiet stretch of road, or do what GG did. Businesses often keep their rented bins locked. The police have been known to go through illegally dumped trash to find incriminating evidence (to identify the owner.)

- A.

Re: Fragmented sentences

New2grammar — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 04:26:47 GMT

OK. Thanks, Delmobile.

Re: Fragmented sentences

Delmobile — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 04:24:15 GMT

I mean starting out an essay in one tense and switching to another, sometimes in the same paragraph. It's fine in a colorful story about tossing your grandma's cornstarch in a dumpster, but not in a formal analysis of, oh, Russian propaganda techniques during the second World War.

Re: Fragmented sentences

New2grammar — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 04:03:51 GMT

Delmobile
New2G, be careful - my teenagers frequently get into trouble with their school essays when they can't stay in one tense.

I don't really understand why native speakers will get into trouble for switching tenses. Isn't it part of everyday speech which is why they do tense switching in their essays in the first place?

I understand that even native speakers make spelling mistakes and occasional subject-verb agreement mistakes. But I don't think I've heard or seen any native speaker make tense mistakes. Oh..it's very likely because I don't know tense switching well enough. Could you give an real world example of a tense switching mistake committed by a native? I don't believe they woudl say "Yesterday, I see a man" or I graduate last year"

Sorry, If I'm asking a lot.
Thanks in advance.

Re: Fragmented sentences

New2grammar — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 03:54:44 GMT

Thanks, Delmobile for a nice writing. I'm amazed how you squeezed so much information into one sentence and still sound so natural.

Re: Fragmented sentences

Delmobile — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 03:50:56 GMT

Wow, all those posts while I was crafting my wonderful example!

GG, what a hysterical story. I'm sure Grandma was cracking up right along there with you.

Yes, the tense switching back and forth is tricky, but it can be so effective. Many modern authors (at least it seems like many to me) write in ALL present tense, which for some reason I cannot stand. I just can't relax and enjoy the story. But a little dose of it here and there, as GG says, does put you right into the cornstarch-exploding picture.

New2G, be careful - my teenagers frequently get into trouble with their school essays when they can't stay in one tense.

Re: Fragmented sentences

Delmobile — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 03:38:55 GMT

To my horror, I see that I screwed up the dashes again in my earlier post, and it's too late to edit. That whole section that is typed in strikethrough is supposed to have a dash both before and after it.

Okay, an example. Let's see.

"So, John says he wants to go downtown to the arts festival Friday night, you know, get a little culture and see and be seen, not that there's ever anyone to see or be seen by in the places we can afford to go, but he wants to at least make the effort. So I spend an hour and a half getting ready to go out, including painting my toenails and then fixing the one that got screwed up when I put my shoes on before the polish was dry and tweezing my eyebrows and squeezing my fat butt into Spanx because the only possible thing I have to wear is the black skirt and it doesn't fit right because OF COURSE I'm bloating, not to mention PMS-ing - anyway, so finally after all this I go teetering downstairs in the skintight black skirt and the new black patent f*ck-me shoes, and John is just sitting there in front of the TV. You guessed it - he's fallen asleep. I mean, he's freaking SNORING."

When I'm writing stuff like this and realize I've gone on too long, instead of going back and dividing up into shorter sentences, I just throw in an "anyway" or two.

Re: Fragmented sentences

Grammar Geek — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 03:19:05 GMT

Yes, it's supposed to put the reader right there, as though the reader is viewing the scene with me. I could have, and maybe should have, said "just explodes."

It's a tricky thing to do, and when it works, it works - and when it doesn't, it looks like a mess. I can't say I do it "right" all the time either.

Re: Fragmented sentences

New2grammar — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 03:07:50 GMT

Thanks, Avangi for your generous comment. Yes, I'm really poor at punctuation - something to work on.

By the way, Is your last post for me? "be sure to shred the paperwork"

GG, I noticed a sudden change of tense in your writing. I love it but kind of afraid to use the style for fear of being wrong. I feel that the change makes the story alive. Shifting from past to present like this makes me feel I'm there at the time. I really like the style but as a non-native, I don't dare to attempt it. IF you have any tips when it can be used, I would really appreciate it.

We waited until it was closed and drove around back - only to find the Dumpsters are WAY taller in an industrial setting. So Jeanne was barefoot on the hood of the car, and I'm tossing bags up to her and she's tossing them in the Dumpster, and then the cornstarch in one of the bags just exploded everywhere.

Re: Fragmented sentences

Avangi — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 02:46:12 GMT

Next time, be sure to shred the paperwork.

Re: Fragmented sentences

Grammar Geek — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 02:39:05 GMT

Del, my "Under Cover of Darkness at the Piggly Wiggly" is the story that needs the most polishing, but it's 100% true. After Grandma Pearl died, we had to find a way to dispose of all the stuff that couldn't go to the Salvation Army and the food panty and so on - all the opened food and such. I think the reason my sister and I had to do it is that we're the ones who'd drunk the least beer that night, so we were sober enough to drive. We waited until it was closed and drove around back - only to find the Dumpsters are WAY taller in an industrial setting. So Jeanne was barefoot on the hood of the car, and I'm tossing bags up to her and she's tossing them in the Dumpster, and then the cornstarch in one of the bags just exploded everywhere. We were soaked with sweat and this stuff just clung to us like clown make up. We were terrified that the Piggy Wiggly owner would follow this trail of corn starch through town "to the house of a dead woman" and incriminate us all. We laughed so hard I can't believe we didn't pee our pants. I like to think that Grandma would have been giggling too.