Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Criminal Sentence 24: Hi (Or Bye), Hyphen

At the deli counter:

"Place your order now and it will be ready for you in 15-minutes."

No hyphen necessary!

If you use a descriptive phrase directly before a noun, then you need a hyphen:

The 15-minute movie was too short.

Compare these examples, with correct hyphens:

The 38-year-old was a copy editor.
The copy editor was 38 years old.
It took 25 minutes to go shopping.
The 25-minute shopping trip was fun.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.