Use supplementary appositives, noun phrase constituents designed to convey additional information, in all your sentences

(with thanks to Language Log)
The dog, a mottled grey lurcher with a lazy eye, regarded me superciliously. I had no idea how I, a simple dog-fearing man, would manage to sneak past it and through the gate, a rusted metal barrier, to freedom. I shifted on my feet, those fleshy and ever-so-slightly arthritic appendages, nervously.
‘Good doggie,’ I, an inexperienced dog-soother to say the least, said. ‘Do you want a bone, a hard, calcified material of which animal skeletons are constituted? Do you? Do you?’ I waved the bone, a sheep tibia, at him. I just had to buy myself enough time, the abstract concept describing the indefinite continued progress of events, to run away.
The dog, an imposing presence with its powerful jaws, two perfectly evolved pincers capable of crushing a human leg, one of the limbs upon which a person stands, growled. It was now, the conceptual moment at which these events were happening, or never, at no time in the future. I, the person trying to escape from the dog, the animal which was threatening my health, the state of being free from illness or injury, a specific instance of physical harm or damage, started running.

20 comments:

  1. Alas, I, a simple wife and mother of three, often do that, add additional noun phrases for further explanation, to my writing.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I, the person, a member of the human race, an event where cars go around in loops to attempt to go past one another, who is sitting at this computer, a person, a member of the human race, an event where cars go around in loops to attempt to go past one another, designated as performing many computations for the sake of others, found this funny, an adjective used to describe strange-looking persons, members of the human race, an event where cars go around in loops to attempt to go past one another.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I fell apart at "a hard, calcified material ...". Bravo!

    ReplyDelete
  4. I agree, next time I come in contact with an angry dog I will make sure to have a sheep tibia on hand:)
    Stickely you make my day.

    ReplyDelete
  5. "time, the abstract concept describing the indefinite continued progress of events" .... man you're GOOD, a relative term used to adjectivize, a gerund neologism, quality!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thank you for making me laugh, the repeated sounds a person makes when they are happy or a amused, amused being the state of contentment and humor created by a writer such as yourself, or a human being who types words into constructed order with the intent of supporting a main idea or thesis. Thank You!

    ReplyDelete
  7. This is pretty much a snapshot of my casual conversation

    I wonder why I have problems staying on topic.

    Beautifully done.

    ReplyDelete
  8. They should use posts like these in the Reading Aloud portion of some sequel to Brain Age.

    ReplyDelete
  9. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  10. HaHAH! I love this!! As an editor, I often see this in fiction writers' work. I do it myself sometimes, but I try to limit it so that when I do offer extra gravy, the readers will really focus on it...instead of skip past it when it's the umpteenth description in a paragraph.

    Thanks for these, Joel!

    ReplyDelete
  11. On reading this I gave a loud guffaw , a noisy laugh indicating immoderate amusement but very little refinement of feeling .

    ReplyDelete
  12. I really enjoyed your blog entry, the reverse chronicled web log. I, the writer of this comment, find your humor refreshing as I bottle feed my son in the wee hours of the morning.

    ReplyDelete
  13. I applaud you but will not take the time to write witty comments no one reads

    ReplyDelete
  14. Hate to correct, to remove errors or faults, you Vagabond, an itinerant person or drifter, but your use, the act of employing, using, or putting into service, "adjectivize" is a malapropism, a grotesque or inappropriate use of a word, and even if it were a "gerund neologism", two words which both mean different things, gerund meaning a verb in the "-ing" form used as a nound, a neologism meaning "a newly coined term, word, or phrase that may be in the process of entering common use, but has not yet been accepted into mainstream language,(another malapropism on your part), you, being the person I'm talking to, didn't state, in other words, declare or make plain, what kind, as in type, it was in your example, a demonstration with the aim of informing others how a task should be performed, and thus killed, as in caused to expire, the momentum, force of speed or impetus; as of a physical object or course of events, observable occurrences.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Why aren't you writing new entries???
    I miss you. COME BACK!!!

    ReplyDelete
  16. Guilty of this one. The comma button on my keyboard has its description starting to fade from overuse.

    ReplyDelete