by Sue Horner | May 23, 2023 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
When Canadian music legend Gordon Lightfoot died on May 1 at the age of 84, tributes flooded in. They praised his songwriting abilities and ballads that brought Canadian stories to the world. “A songwriter without parallel, his melodies and words were an...
by Sue Horner | Feb 23, 2023 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
Metaphors are marvellous when you want to explain something complicated, give an idea of size, make a point memorably – or just make someone smile. “An especially apt metaphor surprises and delights,” says author Jack Hart in A Writer’s Coach: An Editor’s Guide to...
by Sue Horner | Oct 25, 2022 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
Brown bears are big. I mean, BIG. You probably have to guess at the size, but would you guess “seven times the average American adult”? That’s Chunk, at 1,200 pounds the runner-up in the annual Fat Bear Week, October 5 to 11 this year. The winner, Bear 747 (shown...
by Sue Horner | Jun 14, 2022 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
Part of the joy of running your own business is playing hooky on a random weekday. So it was that my husband and I spent a recent day enjoying a visit to Toronto’s Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) followed by a Toronto Blue Jays baseball game. For the second time, the ROM...
by Sue Horner | May 28, 2022 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
Safety precautions like a national marshmallow test. The spread of COVID-19 like glitter. Fighting the virus like a game of whack-a-mole. I first shared these and other pandemic analogies at the end of 2020, thinking it would be a one-time thing. Remember thinking it...
by Sue Horner | Feb 28, 2022 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
“Corporate” writing doesn’t need to be so “corporate.” Employee communications consultant Steve Crescenzo thinks it gets that way when people write for the approver, not the reader. He advises taking the “corporate” out of corporate comms and replacing it with...
by Sue Horner | Sep 24, 2021 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
Don’t you appreciate when people use creative ways to help you understand something complicated? This is especially welcome as we continue grappling with COVID-19. These days, scientists are explaining how vaccines or preventive measures work, the perfect situation...
by Sue Horner | Apr 23, 2021 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
Maybe you’ve noticed this about the pandemic, too: People speaking about all things COVID-19 are trying to make them easier to understand. Or, sometimes, they’re trying to make a point about actions that are or are not working. Want to explain how the virus works or...
by Sue Horner | Dec 21, 2020 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
For the past few years, my December newsletter has shared some “life is short” moments. I have more – and during these pandemic times, so do many of us – but I’m shutting the door on this dumpster fire of a year with another look at creative ways people have tried to...
by Sue Horner | Oct 21, 2020 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
Do you want to explain something, make a point or spark that “aha” moment? Reach for what I call expressive writing, which shows rather than tells, often through similes and metaphors. Similes show how two things are alike, using “like” or...
