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(Originally published on Fimfiction)

Don’t get me wrong, you can do a lot of fun stuff with horsecock. It’s the word “horsecock” I have a problem with.

Let me ask you this: If you were writing a story that takes place in our human world, would you call someone’s dick a “humancock”? Probably not. In our human world, a “humancock” is just a cock.

The same idea applies in a world filled with horses: A “horsecock” is just a cock.

There is only one place I can imagine “horsecock” being legitimate: a story that involves someone “bringing” a horsecock from Equestria into the human world of Equestria Girls. In this case, a horsecock isn’t the norm in the human world, so it’s fine to use that term.

Another place that you might argue for is in an anthro story, where the form of the penis could be either equine or human. But I’d favor just describing the penis and letting the reader figure it out.

A thing I’ve noticed is that sometimes people capitalize the names of seasons: “It was the middle of Spring.”

Not quite. Seasons are normally considered common nouns, which means they aren’t capitalized in the middle of a sentence: “It was the middle of spring.”

Seasons are capitalized, though, when they are personified, that is, given person-like traits. If a season “does” something, for example, then it’s likely personified: “As Spring blew its soft breeze…”

If a season is personified, treat its name as a person’s name. So don’t put “the” before it (“Spring”, not “the Spring”), and don’t use it as an adjective directly (“Spring’s breeze,” not “Spring breeze”).

http://theeditorsblog.net/2011/05/07/single-quotation-marks-a-readers-question/

A few stories I’ve read use a strange style of quotation marks: Double quotation marks for quotations, and single quotation marks for single words.

For example:

She said wearily, “Hello, how are you?” but most of them didn’t even hear her feeble ‘greeting’ attempt.

No.

As the article in the link explains, you should use single quotation marks only if you normally start quotations with single quotation marks.

So, it’s either:

She said wearily, 'Hello, how are you?’ but most of them didn’t even hear her feeble 'greeting’ attempt.

Or:

She said wearily, “Hello, how are you?” but most didn’t even hear her feeble “greeting” attempt.

There are also a few technical cases where single quotation marks are used, such as plant cultivars. In these cases, you should use single quotation marks even if you normally start quotations with double quotation marks:

The specimen was a Malus domestica 'Red Delicious’. “So, an apple,” he said.

In a previous post I talked about how “alright” is overused. But “alright” is becoming more accepted, and it’s necessary in more cases than I thought.

I said that you could write, “The weather is all right today.” You could argue that that actually means the weather is totally good or “correct,” rather than simply okay. “The weather is alright,” on the other hand, means the weather is okay.

This change in meaning is highlighted in, “The numbers are all right,” as opposed to, “The numbers are alright.” The first means that all the numbers are correct; the second means that the numbers are acceptable.

So go ahead. But I won’t be too quick to follow, alright?

I recently read a story that contained the phrase “as many sperm…as possible.”

“Many sperm”?

Well, it’s not wrong. The plural of “sperm” is in fact “sperm”, and there are millions of sperm in typical male ejaculate. And even though fluids tend to be uncountable, we could still count “many drops” of a fluid.

But “many sperm” seems strange. I think it’s because I would’ve expected “much sperm,” since people tend to think “sperm” and “semen” mean the same thing.

Well, they don’t: Semen is the fluid that is ejaculated, and it contains sperm (along with many other substances). So “much sperm” is flat-out wrong.

But I still have an issue with “many sperm.” I don’t think it conveys the right message: Are we focused on the tiny swimming cells looking for an egg? Or are we focused on the fluid? I think it’s the latter.

The other thing that bothers me about this is that it reminds me that biology and sex-ed classes don’t teach enough about human reproduction. Kinda like “vagina” (ugh!).

So, if you really must, use “semen.” Of course, you should be using a euphemism or slang term instead:

  • I like “fluids,” but this can be ambiguous.
  • See if you can get away with “juices.”
  • “Spunk” needs to make a comeback. “Cum” is just too informal, in my view.

perfectfuta:

A cum shot, cumshot, cum blast, come shot, pop shot, or money shot are slang terms used to describe a person ejaculating (in film or video, or image in a pornographic magazine), usually onto a person or object. (from Wikipedia). Hope that helps.

Yes, “come” is the original spelling (though I have to admit I’ve never seen “comeshot” as one word).

Pretty much every time you use “alright”, “all right” can be substituted in its place. It’s just as understandable, but it looks much better.

The only times you need to use “alright” are when you use it as an adjective before a noun, as in, “We’re having alright weather today.” (Note that you can still write, “The weather is all right today.”)