Annoying little things that have crossed the radar.

Air on the side of caution

Uh, no. It’s err.

But, as the poet said, to err is human, to forgive divine.

Just desserts

Those who grew up in Toronto in the 1980s may remember a restaurant of this name, which served nothing but cakes and fruit pies.

The moniker was a play on the phrase just deserts, which (with the emphasis on the second syllable of deserts) means ‘due recompense’.

With the emphasis on the first syllable of deserts, the phrase would mean ‘solely arid wastelands’.…

What is trauma-informed lawyering?

Myrna McCallum–a former prosecutor and Indian Residential School adjudicator–sees it as a critical competency requirement, yet one that’s missing from law school and bar course curriculums.

Today’s tip is to learn about trauma-informed lawyering through McCallum’s podcast, the Trauma-Informed Lawyer, which she has created in partnership with the Canadian Bar Association.

McCallum sets out to offer some of that education through in-depth conversations with fellow lawyers, judges, academics and others on vicarious trauma, restorative/transformative justice, cultural humility, trauma and diversity, and many more vitally important topics.

From episode 1:

“I created this podcast to educate, …

Yet more.

Above-captioned
This is a truly awful way to describe anything.

Substitute this or a concise description of the subject of your e-mail or letter and it will read oh, so much better.

Action item
Plain old task will do nicely, thank you.

And please don’t action anything; it’s not a verb.

Ecosystem
If something isn’t a space (the derivatives space, the cannabis space, the cryptocurrency space), it’s an ecosystem – or, indeed, its own ecosystem.

Meaning (I think), subject to its own set of rules, like those of a particular jurisdiction. So, not really …

There are two principal and related uses of ellipsis (…), both based on their function to indicate that something has been left out (ellipsis means ‘omission’ in Greek).

The first is what we might call the technical use. Here, ellipsis shows that a specific word or larger portion of text has been omitted from a quotation: ‘I did … have sexual relations with that woman …’ (Bill Clinton, 1998).

Be careful when doing this, as in the Clinton example. There, the second ellipsis marks the missing name ‘Miss Lewinsky’, which hardly needs to be supplied; but the first one …

In a previous tip, I referred very briefly to the fact that the Canadian federal government and some provinces offer RSS feeds that can be used to track the progress of legislation. 

The federal RSS legislative feed is very flexible, allowing you to choose exactly what information you want to track. You can set up your feed to monitor the progress of specific (or all) bills, let you know when legislative amendments are proposed for specific acts, or see what acts have received Royal Assent. 

If you’re interested in creating your own custom RSS feed, you’ll find a box …

Oh, so many pitfalls. Here are a few more that have crossed the radar recently.

Credible/creditable

The first means ‘believable’, as in Inconsistencies in the witness’s testimony led inevitably to the conclusion that her evidence was not credible.

The second is sometimes (erroneously) used for credible, perhaps by writers who think that an extra syllable adds weight or effect. Creditable really means ‘reputable’ or ‘bringing credit to’: Irwin Law is a highly creditable publisher of legal titles.  

Presumptive/presumptuous

Clearly from the same root, like presume, and sometimes used interchangeably – but best not.

Presumptive should be …

If something isn’t a conversation these days, it’s a situation.

An extreme weather situation. Or, on public transport in Toronto, any number of the following in service announcements on ttc.ca: an emergency situation, a power-off situation, a flooding situation, even a full-throttle situation.

All can be recast without the situation bit: extreme weather, an emergency, a power-outage, a flood – although admittedly a substitute for the full-throttle thing doesn’t come readily to mind.

I’d even avoid situation on its own, as there are less tired expressions: incident, circumstance, …

Many people do, like the drafters of a contract at issue in an Indiana case brought to our attention by Ross Guberman in a LinkedIn post.

The contract made one party responsible for ‘the periodic repair of damages to said Easement area caused by vehicular traffic (i.e. potholes)’.

That party argued it was therefore not responsible to repaint lines in the area in question (a parking lot) after normal wear and tear from traffic not causing potholes.

The trial court held that potholes were but one example of damage to the parking lot. The Indiana Court of Appeals reversed, …

If you’ve been asked to find foreign materials in a jurisdiction you know little or nothing about, GlobaLex (https://www.nyulawglobal.org/globalex/index.html) provides a number of country-specific resources covering Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. Resources include an overview of the country’s legal system, links to legislation and court materials (as available), and are updated regularly.

Among the foreign materials GlobaLex includes a guide to finding U.S. federal materials which provides a very helpful overview to what is freely available for the United States.

— Susannah Tredwell…

They mean the same thing: consisting of three parts or things, three in number, three times an amount.

A treble is also a singer with a soprano voice, often a choirboy, or a musical instrument in a high key.

In the number-related sense, treble and triple can both can be verbs, nouns, adjectives or adverbs.

Readers of Private Eye may recall the frequent cry of ‘Trebles all round!’ in the ‘Corporation Street’ series (a satire on the BBC), meaning triple measures of spirits.

Treble seems to be more common in Britain – but has a strange persistence in North …