Homophones sound the same but are spelled differently. People often confuse homophone pairs, and bare and bear are no exception. Which phrase is correct—bear with me or bare with me?
Besides being the name of a big furry animal, bear functions as a verb. It means to tolerate, to carry something, or to endure.
The past tense of the verb lead is led, not lead. One reason for the confusion might be that a similar verb, read, has an infinitive that’s spelled the same as the past tense. But with lead, that’s not how things are.
Led is the past tense of the verb lead:
At any given time, everyone is trying to break at least one bad habit.
Bad habits sap our confidence, time, and energy and keep us from living our healthiest, most productive, and happiest lives.
Whether you want to eat better, improve teamwork skills, quit smoking, listen more, or something else, we’ve compiled some best practices that will have you breaking bad habits for good.
The author James Michener said, “I’m not a very good writer, but I’m an excellent rewriter.” If you’re an aspiring author or someone striving for clarity in your professional or academic writing, you appreciate the methodical march of the rewriting process. Each word in a sentence has a job; cut those that do nothing. These six tips will help you achieve clear and concise writing.
In British English, the first letter after a colon is capitalized only if it’s a proper noun or an acronym; in American English, the first word after a colon is sometimes capitalized if it begins a complete sentence.
Here are some quick tips for using colons properly:
Is Friday a super productive work day? Or are you starting to wonder why you bother coming in at all? For many of us, getting through the day on Friday (especially the afternoon) can be a real struggle.
Who doesn’t get that #FridayFeeling?
After a long week of getting stuff done, we’re just ready for the weekend to begin. Staying focused on work can feel impossible, but indulging in a lighter work day can be guilt-inducing when we expect (or others expect) that we’ll get more work done than we actually do.
Why is it so easy to confuse less and fewer? Perhaps because they both represent the opposite of the comparative adjective more. Luckily, the conundrum of less vs. fewer has a solution that is simple to remember. It involves deducing whether fewer or less will be working with a countable or uncountable noun in your intended sentence.
In English, we use the same word, more, for a greater number and a greater amount/quantity.
