Q. What verb tense should I use in a construction such as “as of this writing”? “As of this writing, the full data from the 2014 survey were not available, so we use data from the 2011 survey,” or “As of this writing, the full data from the 2014 survey are not available, so we use data from the 2011 survey”? Were sounds better to me until I get to the use, which seems to conflict.
Q. Which is preferred: We got your back, We’ve got your back, We have your back? It will be used in an informal, conversational piece, but there’s disagreement among my coworkers on what is correct.
Q. Hello there!! I am writing to ask if you could shed some light on the usage of the expression “regard shall be had.” One of my teachers at my translation course uses it constantly as an equivalent to Spanish expressions such as “en función a” and differentiates this use of “regard” from transition linkers such as “regarding” or “with regard to.” Let me provide you with one sentence, which was actually discussed in class: “Regard shall be had to the best interest of the Argentine Audit office.” (This was our translation for the Spanish sentence “Se estará a los intereses de la Auditoria General de la Nación.”) But this expression does not really make sense to me as I haven’t heard or seen it in many contexts. I was wondering if you could provide me with more information about this use of “regard” and whether this expression (“regard shall be had”) can be used in both the active and the passive voice.
Q. Is changing and to or in the following sentence necessary grammatically? “Ghrelin does not bind and activate GHSR.”
Q. A friend and I are disagreeing about the following phrases: “less and less likely” versus “more and more unlikely.” I say they are equal in meaning. He says that only the first one is correct. Your opinion, please.
Q. I am editing a ms for young adult fiction and this sentence struck me as odd, but I can’t find any reference on CMOS that it’s wrong: “We both have places to be, however much I’d like to stay here with her the rest of the day.” I’m having trouble with “however much.” I commented in the ms that replacing “however much” with “as much as” would flow better, but I’m curious if “however much” is actually grammatically wrong.
Q. In your January Q&A, in your response to the question about under commitment and over commitment, you wrote that “it would be best to either close up both or hyphenate both.” I’m trying to eliminate using the word up where it’s unnecessary. It seems to me the vast majority of both up and down uses following verbs are unnecessary. Do you think up is needed in your response?
Q. Tense is confusing me, and it’s probably because I’m overanalyzing everything. Please help! Aren’t the two verb tenses saying the same thing? And if so, is paragraph consistency the deciding factor on which tense to use? “The early work focused/focuses on . . .” “Once the cards are / have been put away . . .” “I hope this gives / will give you courage . . .” “As we discuss/discussed in the previous paragraph . . .”
Q. The other day a colleague asked me if it’s permissible to use the expression “a momentum” in a sentence. I told him that momentum is a noncount noun and isn’t normally used with articles (a or the). In fact, after a cursory search, I could not find such a usage online. However, the sentence “we’ve built up such a momentum” sounds correct (or at least not wrong) to my ear. So I later emailed him to say that it’s correct to use momentum without an article, but it isn’t wrong to use an article. Am I being wishy-washy?
Q. What does The Chicago Manual of Style recommend for the usage of make vs. makes?