Articles—So Tiny Yet So Important
Sometimes It's the Little Things That Matter Most
"I'm a writer and editor."
Unless you write it as "I'm a writer and an editor," you are neither.
Gettin' Laid While Lyin' Around
Lies are what you tell so you can lay someone on the side. But more to the point, lay is transitive (i.e., it takes an object), whereas lie is not. This is further complicated because some idiot decided the past tense of lie should be lay, which also happens to be a present-tense verb. But back to how to know what to write. If you can lay something , it's lay: lay the book down, lay some bricks, lay your best friend's girlfriend. This use of lay is known as a transitive verb. It transitions based on its meaning when combined with the object it affects. Even Ratt knew this, of course: With lie, there's no object: I'm going to lie down now, don't just lie there, he was lying on the bed. But note that in past tense, lie becomes lay: I lay there all day, NOT I laid there all day, BUT I laid (past tense of lay) the book down. In this usage, lie and lay are called intransitive verbs—they don't have objects, so they don't change. Ex
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