Bitsy Wants You to, Like, Totally Fix Your Punctuation
Bitsy Wants You to, Like, Totally Fix Your Punctuation
Farnsworth's Copyeditor "Friend" Has Some Words of Advice on The Use of Ellipses
So, like, I went to my usual hairstylist the other day, right? And she was telling me about this grody orc dude she sees passing by her salon everyday, and how this weird red rain follows him, and a bunch of flying paper, and he's always cranky as hell and grumbling about writing errors he sees…
Like, I didn't know she was talking about Farnsworth, okay? (rolls eyes, sighs dramatically) That dude, I swear…
Anyway, Bitsy here! I'm totally here to, like, offer a little advice on not-awesome trends I’ve noticed in our submissions, particularly concerning the ellipses. Stuff I’ll have to copyedit eventually, you know? Stuff that you’ll find in our style guide, when we eventually have one (and make no mistake, a style guide is forthcoming).
When you're, like, using ellipses in sentences, absolutely no spaces after the ellipses unless you're starting a new sentence immediately after, okay, dudes and dudettes? Here are some examples:
Correct: “It would be a shame if your glorious toilet were to…malfunction.”
Incorrect: “It would be a shame if your glorious toilet were to… malfunction.”
Likewise, if your sentence ends with an ellipsis, absolutely no other punctuation should follow. The only exceptions are the exclamation point or the question mark. Like, barf me out, people. Don't be a poser, fer sure. Also, an ellipsis always consists of three consecutive periods. Not four (stares at you with resting Valley Girl orc face), not two, duh. THREE.
Correct: “It would be a shame if your glorious toilet were to malfunction…”
Incorrect: “It would be a shame if your glorious toilet were to malfunction…,”
Allowed: “It’d be a darn shame if your glorious toilet were to malfunction…!”
Allowed: “Wouldn’t it be a shame if your glorious toilet were to malfunction…?”
So. yeah, don't be dweebs! It’d be such a major relief to me to confirm at the bottom of my awesome little black heart that our writers know how to use an ellipsis (plural ellipses) effectively and add it to their toolbox.
Gotta go now, people. I’m, like, overdue for a manicure. Ugh, this pink is totally bogus…
"First shalt thou lay thy hand upon the period on the keyboard. Then, shalt thou type a period three times. No more. No less. Three times shalt be the number thou shalt type, and the number of the typing shalt be three. Four times shalt thou not type, nor either type thou two times, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out! Once the number three, being the third number, be reached in thy typing, only then shalt thou continue."
“You shall have my ellipsis when you pry them from my cold, dead fingertips…”, he snarled.
Is this correct then? There’s that double quote separating the statement from the speech assignment. Does that count as a clean break for punctuation rules?