<p>Okay.. well I picked up the writing section today and did pretty horribly. Need some clarifications on some of the rules....</p>
<p>Are you never aloud to have 2 adverbs follow each other? </p>
<p>"Because our casserole dish was smelling surprisingly badly"</p>
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<p>Whenever you see "__________ between my friends and I/Me"</p>
<p>Is it always me? because the subject is always the ________ before "between"</p>
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<ol>
<li> (level 5 improv paragraph)</li>
</ol>
<p>Which of the following is the best way to combine sentences 6 and 7?</p>
<p>Sentence 6 + 7: In the royal palaces there were to be found many comforts that medieval castles did not offer. These had dark dungeons and damp, drafty, living quarters instead.</p>
<p>B. Lacking many comforts compared to royal palaces, medieval castles instead offered dark dungeons and damp, drafty living quarters.</p>
<p>C. While medieval castles offered only dark dungeons and damp, drafty living quarters, many comforts were to be found in royal palaces.</p>
<p>E. With their dark dungeons and damp, drafty living quarters, medieval castles offered few of the comforts to be found in royal palaces. </p>
<p>Why is E the best choice? </p>
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<p>The shift from traditional to cosmetic dentistry
A. is because adults are getting fewer cavities and becoming more vain
D. is occuring because adults are getting fewer cavities and becoming more vain</p>
The two adverbs are fine; that is not the issue. “Badly” in this case modifies “smelling,” which implies that the act of smelling was poor, which is not the intention of the sentence. The intention is to say that what was being smelled was bad, not that it was smelled badly (i.e., in a bad way, as if the subject’s sense of smell is deteriorated), so you say that the dish was smelling surprisingly bad. Smell in this case is a linking verb (as opposed to an action verb) which means it can be modified by an adjective.</p>
<p>Take these two sentences for instance:
a) “I felt sad about his death.” Feel is a linking verb here, which means it connects the subject (“I”) to the adjective (“sad”). It expresses the sadness of the subject; it does not describe the act of feeling itself.
b) “My friend let me feel his new shoes, but unfortunately I felt them pretty badly at first so I had to request a second feel.” Feel is an action verb here. It is modified by the adverb badly. It has to do with the physical sense of touch, which is described as bad. Therefore, you say that the way in which the subject “felt” the shoes was bad, or poor; or that he felt the shoes badly.</p>
<p>The most common linking verb is be. When you say, “I am sad,” obviously you are not using an adverb to modify the action to be. You are simply describing the state of the subject, so you use the adjective sad instead of the adverb sadly. Another linking verb is turn: “The chameleon turned brown.” Here, “brown” describes the color of the subject, not the chameleon’s process of turning colors. If you want to describe the chameleon’s act of turning colors, you could say, “The chameleon turned colors very quickly.” </p>
<p>
Yes, it is always “me” in this case because “between” is a preposition. It does not matter whether the prepositional phrase “between my friends and me” or any other phrase with a preposition modifies, describes, or expands upon the subject. It is always in the objective case (“me,” not “I”) if there is a preposition.
EXAMPLE: “He, along with me, sings well.”
The prepositional phrase “along with me” is in the objective case and does not affect the subject’s number, so you still say, “He…sings,” not “He…sing.” Of course, this sentence is pretty lousy. You could of course just say, “He and I sing well.”</p>
<p>
There are many things wrong with the other choices. The sentence is stating that medieval castles offer only some of the comforts offered by royal palaces. The sentence wants to describe what some of these comforts are, so it can be constructed in the way it is in (E): “With their dark dungeons…, medieval castles offered few of the comforts to be found in royal palaces.” Do you understand why this is a well-formed sentence? Now look at (C). It uses the passive voice: “many comforts were to be found…” This especially does not fit with the conjunction “while” because the first clause (“medieval castles offered…”) is in the active voice. It’s just lousy and incorrect. Look at (B). The sentence isn’t supposed to be comparing the two things so directly. The sentence uses the word compared and instead, as if someone were comparing the two things and listing what one alternatively offers over the other. There’s a problem of writing style here.
“Because” is a conjunction that connects two clauses. The second clause is supposed to describe the why behind the first clause. Here are the two clauses:
Clause 1: The shift from traditional to cosmetic dentistry is (occurring).
Clause 2: Adults are getting fewer cavities and becoming more vain.
In (A), the first clause does not have the word “occurring.” This means that clause 2 does not explain why the shift is occurring; it appears to explain why the shift is. It’s just an incomplete sentence. The same issue arises when it comes to the phrase because of, too, in which case the alternative would be due to, which acts as an adjective and not a conjunction:
“Raining is due to saturated air.”
“Raining is occurring because of saturated air.”</p>