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This week’s quick and dirty (but I promise, no math) lesson: There is no transitive property of synonyms

The alert coffee bamboozle started in excess of the idle bitch’s sponsor.

Did that make sense to you?  What if I told you it was supposed to mean “The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog’s back?”

Beginning writers often suffer from word fatigue.  Think about when you first started writing dialogue, and every time a character spoke you thought you had to end the sentence with “said.”

“Hello,” Floyd said.

“Hello,” Holly said.

“Isn’t it a nice day,” Floyd said.

“No, I think my father is going to die,” Holly said.

At this point you probably don’t care if Holly is an orphan by the time the next “said” rolls around, right?  That’s word fatigue.  Intermediate writers learn to combat this by using synonyms, but may fall into the next trap: synonyms are words with similar, not identical, meanings.

Here is an EXTREMELY truncated sample of what I see when I look up “said” in my thesaurus: tell, speak, relate, state, announce, remark, pronounce, declare, assert, maintain, opine, answer, respond, reply, affirm, allege, annunciate, argue, articulate, aver, avouch, avow, comment, conclude, contend, crack, disclose, echo, enunciate, exclaim, grant, indicate, insinuate, insist, interject, observe, proclaim, profess, protest, recite, rejoin, repeat, retort, reveal, suggest, verbalize, vocalize, voice, whisper, convey, utter, shout, and burble.

Holy crap.

All of those words can be used to replace “said.”  You might notice, however, that “shout” and “whisper” don’t mean the same thing at all!  Neither do “annunciate” and “enunciate.”  If a word isn’t part of your everyday vocabulary, look it up in a dictionary to make sure it has the right flavor before using it in your writing.  Otherwise you may end up with an alert coffee bamboozle where a quick brown fox should be.

Yeah write, the speakeasy, the gargleblaster and the moonshine grid all in one place every Sunday, Sunday, SUNDAAAAAY

Every Sunday, we kick off a new week of challenges. If you’re not already a subscriber, sign up here to receive our weekly email blasts, and be one of the first to know what to expect for the week. We also detail the week in a tidy Sunday kickoff post, written by our managing editor Christine, while congratulating the winners from our previous challenges. Stop by if you get the chance. It’s good stuff.

Is this your first time here? Welcome!

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If you like, please grab the challenge badge from our sidebar, install it using the HTML view of your post, then visit the other entries on the grid. Did we mention there will be a vote for the best submissions on Thursday? That’s the fun part. Please stick around.

Let’s open the invitational grid this week!

Why don’t we use our social media for good instead of evil this week and recruit our writing/blogging friends to the challenge grid? If we hit 30 entries, we will unlock the invitational grid, which is exactly what it sounds like: a separate grid, by invitation only, for editors to build by adding their favorites. The editors will then award a jury prize to one awesome post. If you know a few people who’ve been meaning to try us out, this would be a great week to convince them what good people we are. Remember, the first one’s free!

Kevin the kiwi and Comment Bob

Everyone knows Kevin by now! He’s that stylish kiwi with the scarf and hat, rooting around for an exceptional post on the grid. When we have fewer than 30 posts in the challenge grid, yours truly will send Kevin home with her favorite post. This week, though, we want Kevin to take a little break while we award the jury prize instead!

Comment Bob flies through open windows at night and leaves pom-poms under the pillows of the readers leaving the most thoughtful comments on each entry on the challenge grid. Just kidding. Penguins can’t fly. He has a jetpack.  The part about the pom-poms, though, is completely true, so please make it a point to participate in our community as a writer, reader, voter and commenter. We call it a challenge for a reason, and making the rounds to all the other blogs is a very large part of it.  Remember, a good comment is more than “great work,” it’s a thoughtful response to the post you just read.

More entries means more votes

The crowd favorite is determined by a moderated popular vote. That means it’s never a clicking contest. We expect our readers to vote for the best on the challenge grid based on technical and artistic merit. here’s the scale:

  • 01-10 submissions: one vote
  • 11-20 submissions: two votes
  • 21-30 submissions: three votes
  • 31-40 submissions: four votes
  • 41-50 submissions: five votes

The more submissions, the more votes. Write a blurb beside your yeah write challenge button inviting your friends to join us. Send a personal email. Talk us up in your writing circles.

Stumble over a blog post you think would be perfect for the challenge grid? Email us the link, and if it’s a good fit, we’ll add it ourselves.

Odds, ends, reminders

  • The badge you will need to add to your planned submission is over in the sidebar
  • This immediate past Sunday is the earliest your submission can be dated
  • Your post can be no longer than 600 words: it’s 500 words plus 100 words grace
  • Personal essays or traditional blog anecdotes only
  • There are no mandatory weekly prompts; the topic is yours. Be compelling
  • The grid is open from Tuesday at 12:01 a.m. to Wednesday at 11:59 p.m.
  • There is voting. Voting will take place Thursday from midnight to 10:00 p.m. US eastern
  • The challenge grid is limited to 50 bloggers
  • The winners’ post will be published by noon on Friday
  • No commercial, sponsored or self-promotional posts are allowed on the yeah write grid, including those containing links to other blog events and Internet contests

Voting is open at the gargleblaster! If you have a chance, stop by, read all the 42-word entries, then vote on the best three of the gargleblaster grid. It’s yeah write’s newest challenge, and we’re quite proud of it!

Yeah write #166 traditional challenge grid is open right here…

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