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This? Is not grammatically correct.
Neither? Is this.
It makes prose? Sound whiny and ineffective.
When I do this? Somebody please kick my butt.
Almost every time I see an ellipsis... a comma would be better.
Commas indicate natural pauses in speaking... as this seems to be trying to do.
If it's meant to add emphasis... it's not working.
When I do this... somebody please kick my butt.
Comma splices are another one, each of these should be a sentence, it drives me crazy when I have to read it, I never know if the writer has a point in mind, in fact I usually start to figure they don't, I'm probably guilty of all three of these too sometimes, maybe I should have been a grade-school English teacher, this kind of thing really jumps out at me, when I do this somebody please kick my butt.
I feel better now.
Neither? Is this.
It makes prose? Sound whiny and ineffective.
When I do this? Somebody please kick my butt.
Almost every time I see an ellipsis... a comma would be better.
Commas indicate natural pauses in speaking... as this seems to be trying to do.
If it's meant to add emphasis... it's not working.
When I do this... somebody please kick my butt.
Comma splices are another one, each of these should be a sentence, it drives me crazy when I have to read it, I never know if the writer has a point in mind, in fact I usually start to figure they don't, I'm probably guilty of all three of these too sometimes, maybe I should have been a grade-school English teacher, this kind of thing really jumps out at me, when I do this somebody please kick my butt.
I feel better now.
no subject
1. As commas, parenthetically. When you want to add information to the middle of a sentence -- like this -- you can use dashes. Conveniently, this also works at the end of a sentence -- like so.
2. As semicolons, more or less indiscriminately. There are times when you want to stick two sentences together without implying any particular relationship -- dashes work just fine for this. Cases in which I would prefer a dash to a semicolon do not spring readily to mind; however, this does not mean they don't exist.
3. In dialogue or speech-like writing, to indicate a break. When one thought is interrupted by another, dashes can be apropri-- appropra-- how do you spell appropriate?
I could get into em-dashes and en-dashes and hyphens and the difference between them, but in ASCII it will only hurt.
no subject
no subject
3 was the only usage I was sure of. :-)