Hi, Paul!  Recently you wrote in a message to Ardith Hinton:   
      
   AH>  And once you'd commented on [Alexander's kludge lines],   
   AH>  I couldn't help running to the dictionary to clarify my   
   AH>  understanding of the word "heuristic"... [grin].   
      
   PQ>  So would I but I don't have a desperate need   
      
      
             Thank goodness... at last I've met somebody who actually knows how   
   to spell "desperate".  For this relief, much thanks... [Wm. Shakespeare].   
      
      
      
   PQ>  to know the meaning with any precision at this time   
   PQ>  of the night,   
      
      
             Ah.  Thanks for the heads up.  That's something others miss when   
   they insist on using UTC time.  If I see a person writing in the middle of the   
   night when they usually arise at dawn & go to bed at sunset, I realize they   
   may be in deep distress.  I'll take a second look and possibly get back to   
   them ASAP even though I have unanswered messages which arrived earlier.  Doing   
   the math I must do to calculate "clock time" in Russia or Australia at the   
   time of writing is a different skill which involves a different part of the   
   brain.  At 22:39 you are ready to hit the sack, while I'm just hitting my   
   stride & wondering if I'll get whatever I've been working on finished by   
   midnight.  Glad to know that....  :-)   
      
      
      
   PQ>  as I have a fair understanding of why the word is used.  ;-)   
      
      
             I know how it is used in the EdBiz, but wasn't sure how it applied   
   in this context.  Fortunately Dallas is well acquainted with both.  :-)   
      
      
      
   [re Alexander's story about the boy & the cigar]   
   PQ>  I see it as a narrative of an incident between two   
   PQ>  people.  I'm trying to keep it simple by looking at   
   PQ>  it as a 'he said', 'we said', 'they said' sort of   
   PQ>  thing, where the story (joke) unfolds as the result   
   PQ>  of the to & fro conversation.  So, I would use double   
   PQ>  quotes for the statements made in the narrative as   
   PQ>  they are the actual words spoken.   
      
      
             Yes, the joke is essentially narrative except for the last two   
   lines. That's why I'd be inclined to keep the quotation marks as well.  :-)   
      
      
      
   PQ>  The simple guide I use is that any words actually   
   PQ>  spoken are in double quotes.  Anything else lending   
   PQ>  to understanding statements made or other actions,   
   PQ>  may be optionally single or double quoted.   
      
      
             In the interests of clarity I prefer to use double quotation marks   
   as my default because they're unlikely to be confused with apostrophes, but I   
   have some concerns WRT your use of the word "optional" in the second sentence   
   above. As you can see I use double quotation marks to set off isolated words &   
   phrases regardless of whether somebody else used them first.  There are   
   conventions WRT quotes within quotes... again, in the interests of clarity.    
   For example:   
      
                "Should I say 'was' or 'were'?" Alexander enquired.  [esp. US]   
                'Should I say "was" or "were"?' Alexander enquired.  [esp. UK]   
      
   Either way is correct, and whichever others prefer is fine with me.  I can't   
   be sure from the above description, however, whether you've grasped the   
   principle. I bend rules myself from time to time... but only within certain   
   limits.  Maybe the issue of quotes within quotes hadn't occurred to you   
   because you don't read the sort of material where it is likely to arise.  If   
   you use an unconventional style of punctuation because your advisors hadn't   
   considered the matter either, it's no wonder you feel you're up the creek   
   without a paddle sometimes....  ;-)   
      
      
             Anne Stilman, in her book GRAMMATICALLY CORRECT, says:   
      
                The occasional style guide may instruct you to use   
                double marks for some purposes and single marks for   
                others, but most keep things simpler.   
      
   That's another possibility I hadn't considered until I re-read the same pages   
   I turned to awhile ago when Alexander & I discussed this topic.  Style   
   manuals... the bane of my existence, as a university student, because it   
   seemed that every instructor in the English department wanted us to use a   
   different one!  You may have understood perfectly the advice you got from a   
   reputable source & followed it to the letter.  But if this source does things   
   very differently from the way others do them, their methods may confuse rather   
   than assist your readers.  :-Q   
      
      
      
      
   --- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+   
    * Origin: Wits' End, Vancouver CANADA (1:153/716)