Sins of Our Fathers | Author Blog

I was reminded the past week by someone reading my novel that I needed to use the search feature on my trusty word processor and check some oft misused words.

The words being its and it’s; you’re and your; they’re, there, and their; and loose, lose, and loss.

I’ll admit it, I frequently use the wrong spelling of the word I mean to use. I think it’s the frustrating problem my mind has with sound. It’s sounds like its to me, as does your and you’re.

There, they’re, and their are worse when they bang around my cranium and exit through my fingers spilling upon my laptop. I give thanks that the laptop has yet to short out. Of course loose, lose, and loss are… well, okay there may be no excuse for those three.

But I ran the software and… have mercy I had a lot of it’s where I should have had its in Sins of Our Fathers.

My only consolation, and it’s not much for a writer critical of himself, is that it’s a common malady according to editors. I heard as much when it was my pleasure to attend the Florida Christian Writers Conference last year. But don’t take my word for it. Chip MacGregor, an editor, lists it as a pet peeve of his. And heaven forbid we writers should trip on an editors pet peeve.

But the fact that it is a malady, means it should be cured. If you’re a writer, I advise you to click over and read some of the other pet peeves MacGregor lists on his blog. They can only serve to keep the English language from sliding in to the gutter. Well, that, and perhaps improve your writing.

[hat tip goes to the Carnival of Christian Writers.]

Did you know that writers can be found performing under the big top?

Well, they can. Who knew?

Click over for the 10th Carnival of Christian Writers. You may learn something about writing.

When I was growing up and in the [tippy title="stellar"]Yeah, you can read that word with wet dripping sarcasm.[/tippy] public school system, there was talk in the social science classes of victimless sins. Pornography and prostitution were two of the sins that I recall being bandied around back in my high school days.

The general consensus that the teachers helped the [tippy title="oh so intelligent and erudite"]Yeah, sorry that would be sarcasm again.[/tippy] fifteen and sixteen year-old children reach was that there was nothing wrong with those victimless behaviors because they involved just one person – or they took place behind closed doors, in park bushes, parked cars, or filthy public bathrooms. They were after all not hurting anyone and as the popular ideology was during the sex-scandal in the White House, “A person’s morals don’t matter, it’s whether he/she can do the job.”

The false notion is that sin can exist in a vacuum packed state.

It can’t and never will.

This is one of the facts of sin that I try to bring out in, Sins of Our Fathers. Sin, whether over generations or hours, rots the soul. It is never satisfied with a stable state of existence because one sin can never satisfy and eventually it must shift and change into something just a bit more dirty, a bit more rotten than the previous condition.

I’m reminded of this fact because of a New York Times article I read this afternoon.

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Now, this isn’t a post exclusive to writers. I think others will find the tips and software I’m about to mention helpful. However, I’m writing today about them out of the usefulness I’ve found in utilizing them for my writing.

It writing, specifically blogging, I discovered this past week a product called, Texter.

It’s a simple little program that you can program to insert common words, code, and do other nifty tricks that you frequently use in writing.

For example, as a blogger I often create links to other sites, like the one above to the Texter program. That typically means typing in the html code by hand. Well, with Texter I’ve got it programmed to watch for my typing of href followed by the Tab key. When it sees me do this it automatically inserts the html code and copies over the link from my clipboard into the code for me.

If you are proficient with a word processor than you know that there is a similar feature in the word processor. The beauty of Texter, though, is that it works in any program where you can type and it has the ability to copy and paste from your clipboard. So whenever I have a block of text that I want to include in blockquote, I copy the text to the clipboard, then in my blog I type bl followed by the Tab key and it inserts the code for the blockquote and the copied text.

Oh, and best of all, Texter is free! Perfect for the starving artist’s budget.

Speaking of free, a commenter here, informed me that some software I had posted about in the past that I found useful in the creation of my novel, Sins of Our Fathers, has been improved. Best of all they have a version of the software that is also free.

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Howdy,

Been a bit of a while, I know. I’ve found that running two blogs doesn’t increase my time for posting.

I have no idea why it works out that way.

My other blog is of course The Great Separation.

But I’ve also been busy trying to catch up on all the work I was unable to accomplish due to my broken foot. I have so much to do now that I’m back on my feet.

And I recently had the pleasure of meeting in person the stunningly wonderful woman and author, Jodi Cowles, of whereisjodi fame. She spent over a week down here on her book tour for her political thriller, The Minor Protection Act.

I highly recommend this book. I think one of the most intriguing things about her book is that Jodi’s genesis for it came in the fact that Christians in China have been praying for persecution to come upon the Christians in America.

Anyway, pick up a copy. You won’t be disappointed.

I’ve also been working on another edit of my book and hope to have it out the door within the next week, Lord willing.

Oh, for you bloggers out there, I’ve got a real neat application that is free and highly useful.

It’s called Texter.

It’s a text substitution app described this way:

Text substitution app Texter saves you countless keystrokes by replacing abbreviations with commonly used phrases you define.

Unlike software-specific text replacement features, Texter runs in the Windows system tray and works in any application you’re typing in. Texter can also set return-to markers for your cursor and insert clipboard contents into your replacement text, in addition to more advanced keyboard macros.

I use it for inserting href coding and blockquotes and stuff like that. But you can do a lot more than that with it.

Well, anyway, that’s were I am and where I’ve been. I’ll say, “Until next time,” and step over to editing my novel.

Chow.