At work this morning, I'm assisting our Research Writer and Publications Editor create a style-guide providing boundaries for future Park Publications. It's an interesting project - and there's much to learn in the process....like the following 20 Rules of Writing:

1. Shun and avoid the employment of unnecessary, excess extra words.
2. Make certain all sentences are full and complete. If possible.
3. Avoid cliches like the plague.
4. Take pain's to spell and, punctuate correctly.
5. BE consistent.
6. Don't approximate. Always be more or less precise.
7. Avoid pointless repetition, and don't repeat yourself unnecessarily.
8. Don't use no double negatives.
9. Don't never use no triple negatives.
10. All generalizations are bad.
11. Take care that your verb and subject is in agreement.
12. A preposition is a bad thing to end a sentence with.
13. Don't use commas, which aren't necessary.
14. "Avoid overuse of 'quotation' marks."
15. And't don't start a sentence with a conjunction.
16. Reserve the apostrophe for it's proper use and omit it when its not necessary.
17. Avoid run-on sentences they are hard to read.
18. Proofread carefully to see if you any words out.
19. Never use that totally cool, radically croovy out-of-date slang.
20. Avoid those long sentences that just go on, and on, they never stop, they just keep rambling, and you really wish the person would just shut up, but no, they just keep on going, they're worse than the Energizer Bunny, they babble incessantly, and these sentences, they just never stop.